Skill set used: Ethnographic Research, Contextual Research, Data Collection and Analysis, Observations, Interviews, Cultural Probe, Affinity Diagramming, Idea Visualization, Tool selection and application, Conceptualizing, Prototyping
Quoting Sylvia Mathews Burwell “While natural disasters capture headlines and national attention short-term, the work of recovery and rebuilding is long-term”. Those headlines may give us facts and figures, but what they don’t talk about is the psychological trauma that people go through before, during and after the occurrence of a disaster.
The intent of this study was: First to understand the different journeys of various stakeholders impacted by the Hurricanes through a contextual research lens; second; to identify insights and possible areas of opportunity for improving preparedness, encouraging a sense of community building and dealing with the aftermath of the disaster.
THE TEAM
My role: Conducting primary & secondary research, developing and generating insights, applying various tools to analyze the collected data, identifying patterns and analyzing them, planning the overall framework of the final presentation and prototyping.
TIMELINE
Our process started with conducting a secondary research on our topic, followed by analyzing and visualizing the found data using tools from our course book- 101 Methods by Vijay Kumar. The second part of the process involved field work and observations. This was then followed by conducting a cultural probe, and analyzing the generated data from the same. We then identified our stakeholders, and conducted interviews.
An integral part of the process was ‘Affinity Diagraming’. It is a process that brings issues and insights across all customers and users together into one space. We affinitized the collected data, concepts and trends.
SECONDARY RESEARCH
Involves the summary, collation and synthesis of existing research. It is a form of market research that is already compiled and organized for us. In our secondary research, we focused on looking at the key facts about the hurricanes that hit Savannah, scanned through buzz reports and used tools such as keyword bibliometric, landscape innovation etc. to analyze our data from the secondary research.
A key performance area in secondary research is the full citation of original sources, usually in the form of a complete listing or annotated listing. Secondary sources could include previous research reports, newspapers, magazines and journals as well as government and NGO statistics.
OBSERVATIONS- RIVER STREET, SAVANNAH, GA
We chose River Street as our location for observations as the area was one of the most impacted ones, in terms of flooding, tourism and wasted food. We visited the area at two separate times, during afternoon and evening in order to understand and do a comparative study of the footfall, activities, and businesses in the at distinct times.
While we were in the process of observation we all concluded that River Street is vulnerable to the effects/after effects of Hurricanes.The business is rooted in these century + old buildings. The infrastructure has been retrofit with a consideration for historic preservation. This approach does create some vulnerability to the loss of business in the case of a disaster.
CULTURAL PROBE - The Emotional Triangle
Cultural Probes are provocation instruments given to participants to inspire new form of self-understanding and communication about their lives, environments, thoughts and interactions.
Since the scope of our topic was large in terms of the intensity of the topic and the diversity of the variables attached to it, we chose to focus on the physical and emotional impact of the Hurricane on people.
As ‘Hurricane’ is a sensitive topic, we had to approach our probe with caution and care. There were three sections of the probe:
Section 1: ‘The Strongest Emotion'- In this section, we wanted to know about the strongest emotion experienced by people out of : Anger | Sadness | Fear | Joy
Section 2: ‘We Care and We Want You to Share’- This was a more open-ended section, in which we provided people a platform to openly express how they felt before, during and after the hurricane.
Section 3: ‘Let’s Talk!’- A platform was given to people to share their experiences with us.
STAKEHOLDER MAP
Stakeholder mapping is a collaborative process of research, debate, and discussion that draws from multiple perspectives to determine a key list of stakeholders across the entire stakeholder spectrum. Mapping can be broken down into four phases:
Identifying: listing relevant groups, organizations, and people
Analyzing: understanding stakeholder perspectives and interests
Mapping: visualizing relationships to objectives and other stakeholders
Prioritizing: ranking stakeholder relevance and identifying issues
The process of stakeholder mapping is as important as the result, and the quality of the process depends heavily on the knowledge of the people participating.
Ethnographic interviewS
We conducted interviews with some of our stakeholders. They helped us explore the topic and the plight of the people of Savannah more deeply.
The Interviews we conducted were done with various people affected by the Hurricanes in Savannah and from different backgrounds.
AFFINITY DIAGRAMMING
Affinity diagraming or rather affinitizing was done post all the data collection. It is a process that brings issues and insights across all customers and users together into one space and allows us to see issues for all users, not just one individual.
Click the play button to get a glimpse of the process
Hunt for Preparedness
Fear, anxiety and uncertainty are the three strongest emotions experienced by the residents of Savannah.
We planned a small activity for our classmates with an intent to give them an idea about how chaotic and stressful the scenario is, when put in that situation. ‘Hunt for preparedness’ was a game of treasure hunt, wherein we alerted our classmates about a hurricane, and gave them 7 minutes to gather all the necessary tools and supplies for protecting themselves and their homes. The supplies in the form of clues were spread across Gulfstream Center of Design.
The emotions experienced by them were: anxiety, stress, excitement and confusion.
OUR OFFERINGS
On the basis of the areas of opportunities we found in our narrowed down greens, during the process of affinitization, the following are our final offerings:
PROCESS BOOK
For an in-depth view of our project, please refer to the process book below: