Our project was implemented in two phases- the first one was the quantitative phase, and the second was the qualitative phase.

QUANTITATIVE PHASE

Why We Chose Crosswalks

• VR
  • Largely internal process that is difficult to quantify
• Restaurants
  • Resists observation. People consider their restaurant booth private space, and change Behavior when they notice that they’re being filmed.
• Watching People’s Dogs (entering and exiting a dog park)
  • Unpredictable nature of dogs.
  • Difficult to map animal Behavior: we are built to observe other humans.
  • Less uniformity of Behavior. Dogs react to different stimuli. 

• Crosswalks
  • Easy to implement “fly on the wall” observation. (People in restaurants notice you filming them. Crosswalkers don’t)
    • Users’ indifference to what is happening around them.
    • High density of data (raw number of transitions)
    • Highly quantifiable

Observation Method Selection

• • A E I O U
    • Draws the attention of the researchers to specific aspects of the Behavior.
    • Tangible results thanks to the worksheet format.
    • Formal method for making the situation easier to understand.
    • AEIOU is an organizational framework reminding the researcher to attend to, document, and code information under a guiding taxonomy of Activities, environments, Interactions, Objects, and Users.

• • Behavioral Mapping
    • Multiple media to work with: We can track Behavior across time with the aid of a map.
    • Useful method for data Visualization.
    • May identify trends and patterns after the fact. 

• • Fly-on-the-Wall Observation
    • Fly-on-the-wall observation allows the researcher to unobtrusively gather information by looking and listening without direct participation or interference with the people or Behaviors being observed.

• • Participation Observation
    • Empathic understanding of subject experience.
    • Low barrier to entry into the “subculture” of crosswalk.
    • Participant observation is an immersive, ethnographic method for understanding situations and Behaviors through the experience of membership participation in an Activity, context, culture, or subculture

• • Task Analysis
    • Task analysis breaks down the constituent elements of a user’s workflow, including actions and interactions, system response, and environmental context.
    • This method includes interviews

• Initial Findings

• • • Mapping: Gathering the raw data for our maps led to a few insights:
      • God’s eye View informed us of the objects of the place:
        • Street signs
        • Dog leashes
        • Phones (in hand)
        • Non-automobile vehicles (scooters, bikes, skateboards, and carts)
        • Beverage
        • Luggage
      • Shade Seeking Behavior
        • Harder to notice from ground View as opposed to looking down from a height.

• Participant Observation

• • • • Pressing to the edge of the street, “bracing” yourself to cross.
      • Bikes and scooter riders considers themselves pedestrians or vehicles depending upon which is most advantageous.
      • Some people would try and predict the system. They may or may not be wrong.
        • Need to ask: How are you forming this prediction.
      • Interviews with jaywalkers: “How do you know it’s OK to cross against the sign?
        • A: Do what everyone else is doing.
        • B: Use your smarts. This guy didn’t have a signal (pointing to a car) so I just went for it.

• AEIOU

• • • It provides formal structure to our observations, ensuring that we don’t miss anything that ought to be obvious.
    • Easy to forget why people are walking
      • To get somewhere fast.
      • To stroll somewhere with a friend.
      • The lone wanderer.

 

QUALITATIVE PHASE

The second phase of our project began with us choosing our methods, and then implementing them in the following order- Role-Playing, Directed Storytelling, and Graffiti Walls.

• Role-Playing
  • Role-playing is a low-risk, low-investment method for conducting qualitative research. Designers take on certain “roles”, and immerse themselves in the situation that is to be researched. Players need to be willing to participate fully. Unenthusiasm can be a deal-breaker. Non-participants are required to document the process properly. Comparisons to real people should be made throughout the process, via other means of research. Improvisation is not just encouraged, but expected. We created some scenarios in order to gather data. Those scenarios are shown in the images below.

• Directed Storytelling
  • Directed Storytelling allows designers to easily gather rich stories of lived experiences from participants, using thoughtful prompts and guiding and framing questions in conversation. We can see from the top the data that we will gather and the methods for gathering them: rich stories out of conversation. It also addresses the difficulty of gathering stories from busy people on moving vehicles, allowing researchers to gather information outside of direct observation methods in a fleeting situation. 
  • Based on our scenarios, we framed certain questions for our interviews, which are given below. These questions address certain themes that we observed during our role-playing.-
    • Theme-Sympathetic characters
      • “Have you ever seen someone in a crosswalk have a close call?
        • Imagine that you saw a little girl wander out into traffic. What would your reaction be?
        • Suppose you saw a businessman on his phone wander out into traffic. What would your reaction be?
      • • Small vehicles having fewer consequences than larger vehicles.
          • Have you ever seen a car accident?
          • Have you ever seen a bicycle accident?
          • What were your feelings during each?  
    • Theme- “It’s not you. It’s other people”.
      • • “It’s not you. It’s other people.” Have you ever heard that line in relation to traffic?
        • Do you worry more about your abilities or other people’s?
      • • People are usually more careful when they’re in unfamiliar places.
          • Do you do much travel? When was the last time you were abroad in a strange city?
          • Do you think differently about traffic when you’re travelling?
            • Why?
    • Theme- Your road rage is justified. Theirs is unreasonable.
      • • Do you ever get road rage? What causes it?
        • Have you ever seen a road rager in the wild? What did you think about them?
    • Theme- The question of leniency versus context
      • Have you ever dodged a light or broken a traffic law? Have you ever been pulled over? Under what circumstances?
        • What were your feelings then, and now?
      • Do you know all the laws for cyclists/scooterists/etc.?
      • Do you think other people know the laws as well as you?
• Graffiti Walls
  • A graffiti wall is an effective ethnographic method because it is able to capture authentic user opinions and ideas through the use of a low-risk, casual system. The guarantee of anonymity encourages users to be candid about their experiences, making it easy for them to generate detailed and nuanced perspectives on a specific event. Additionally, since it is quick to deal with, the user is more likely to respond, making data collection convenient for all parties.
    • Post wall near bike racks and known bird drop-offs
      • Klaus bike racks
      • Tech Square
      • Clough

• • Snapshots of our graffiti board are given below-

 

As one can observe, we gathered a lot of data. We tried to make sense of it, tagging and cross-referencing. But just as important was the way we asked our questions. That exposed us to the reality that we were directing our subjects with those questions. Therefore, with the help of the graffiti wall method, we took ourselves out of the question so that other people could put themselves in. Everyone had a relevant experience, especially with the mundane and the everyday. Any one of these themes could make for a fertile research question. Many people remember the dramatic. Near misses and accidents are often top of mind. Yet it was the unexpected social space of this transient moment—friends met in passing, the rainbow design, the political statement—that are grounds for the most interesting questions. Perhaps it’s better to go in without a pre-existing question? If we were to continue this inquiry, we might look at way we could redesign the crosswalk as a social space. To make it more than mundane.

To make it unexpected… and extraordinary.