Augmenting Access & Mobility: Designing for the Prosthetic Human

<p>With the needs of the disabled person at the forefront of research and design, this thesis questions how the ‘Prosthetic Human’ can be an architectural catalyst to augment access and mobility. Access and Mobility is identified as an underdeveloped field of architectural enquiry. To improve how disabled individuals experience space, this thesis investigates and tests access and mobility through the lens of design. This thesis extends to the notion of access and networks as defined by Jeremy Rifkin through an architectural exploration into innovation centres. Workplace design strategies directs the design process to formulate stimulating environments that facilitate creative and reflective thought. The theoretical frameworks of Marquard Smith and Joanne Mora, Elizabeth Wright and Mark Wigley, concerning post-human conditions are critically discussed and theoretical notions are transposed into design investigations that explore the building as a prosthetic entity. Specifically, this thesis introduces the disabled body – The Prosthetic Human – as a new figurative referent and proportional system in the design of architecture. Corbusian principles and methods are examined and appropriated for the Prosthetic Human. The proportions of the Prosthetic Human informs the architecture at macro, messo, and micro scales. This research finds that by designing for the Prosthetic Human, the architecture is, holistically representative of a body that requires enhanced access and mobility within space. The research is purposeful; the process celebrates difference and in turn, a calm and embracing architecture is presented in hope for those impaired to be free from spatial discrimination in our environment.</p>

Augmenting Access & Mobility: Designing for the Prosthetic Human

<p>With the needs of the disabled person at the forefront of research and design, this thesis questions how the ‘Prosthetic Human’ can be an architectural catalyst to augment access and mobility. Access and Mobility is identified as an underdeveloped field of architectural enquiry. To improve how disabled individuals experience space, this thesis investigates and tests access and mobility through the lens of design. This thesis extends to the notion of access and networks as defined by Jeremy Rifkin through an architectural exploration into innovation centres. Workplace design strategies directs the design process to formulate stimulating environments that facilitate creative and reflective thought. The theoretical frameworks of Marquard Smith and Joanne Mora, Elizabeth Wright and Mark Wigley, concerning post-human conditions are critically discussed and theoretical notions are transposed into design investigations that explore the building as a prosthetic entity. Specifically, this thesis introduces the disabled body – The Prosthetic Human – as a new figurative referent and proportional system in the design of architecture. Corbusian principles and methods are examined and appropriated for the Prosthetic Human. The proportions of the Prosthetic Human informs the architecture at macro, messo, and micro scales. This research finds that by designing for the Prosthetic Human, the architecture is, holistically representative of a body that requires enhanced access and mobility within space. The research is purposeful; the process celebrates difference and in turn, a calm and embracing architecture is presented in hope for those impaired to be free from spatial discrimination in our environment.</p>

THE DARK SIDE OF METHODS – AN EXPLORATION OF THE NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF METHOD USE AND METHOD REFLECTION IN DESIGN

The proper use of methods is increasingly important as design challenges are more complex and involve more stakeholders. Such work also demands high reflective ability from designers. Reflective thought processes do not necessary produce positive outcomes for the process and the individual involved. Positive reflection is goal oriented while negative reflection is typically self-oriented. In design education, reflection by students is often treated as rather trivial or only rudimentary support is offered. Research in cognitive science shows that poor reflection can hurt students' well-being, abilities and confidence over time. Thus, there is a need to better understand method use and reflection in design education more specifically when done poorly. We take a theory-building approach and interviewed 12 design students and recent graduates and investigated instances of method use where these led to negative experiences and effects. In doing so, we show different types of negative experiences that students have when using methods, the effects that these experiences have and how they relate to problematic use of methods and poor reflection practices. We end with implications for design education and design research.

Smooth coping: an embodied, Heideggerian approach to dual-process theory

Dual-process theories divide cognition into two kinds of processes: Type 1 processes that are autonomous and do not use working memory, and Type 2 processes that are decoupled from the immediate situation and use working memory. Often, Type 1 processes are also fast, high capacity, parallel, nonconscious, biased, contextualized, and associative, while Type 2 processes are typically slow, low capacity, serial, conscious, normative, abstract, and rule-based. This article argues for an embodied dual-process theory based on the phenomenology of Martin Heidegger. According to Heidegger, the basis of human agents’ encounters with the world is in a prereflective, pragmatically engaged disposition marked by readiness-to-hand ( Zuhandenheit), sometimes equated with “smooth coping.” Examples of smooth coping include walking, throwing a ball, and other embodied actions that do not require reflective thought. I argue that smooth coping primarily consists of Type 1 processes. The Heideggerian dual-process model yields distinctly different hypotheses from Hubert Dreyfus’ model of smooth coping, and I will critically engage with Dreyfus’ work.

A Critical Examination of Abstraction in John Dewey’s Reflective Thought

The purpose of this paper is to critically examine abstraction in the context of John Dewey’s notion of reflective thought. Abstraction is to be understood as a pragmatic tool that underpins reflective thought. In other words, reflective thought—that is, the capacity to think of practical solutions to problems we confront in our lives,— needs to use the tool of pragmatic abstraction. In the context of reflective thought, I explore and explain how pragmatic abstraction is used. Here, I take issue with how pragmatic abstraction is used as merely a means to bring about ‘successful’ consequences to a problem. This use of pragmatic abstraction fails to consider the critical question of whose success is being brought about. Due to this, ‘successful’ consequences to a problem can result for some, while negative consequences to the same problem can result for others. The ‘reasonable woman standard’ that developed in the law illustrates a concrete example of this problematic split and a legal effort to resolve it. Ultimately, by reconsidering how reflective thought uses the tool of pragmatic abstraction, “successful” consequences to problems are brought about in a more inclusive manner.

Beyond self-reflection: introducing the concept of rumination in personal informatics

Personal informatics tools can help users self-reflect on their experiences. When reflective thought occurs, it sometimes leads to negative thought and emotion cycles. To help explain these cycles, we draw from Psychology to introduce the concept of rumination—anxious, perseverative cognition focused on negative aspects of the self—as a result of engaging with personal data. Rumination is an important concept for the Human Computer Interaction community because it can negatively affect users’ well-being and lead to maladaptive use. Thus, preventing and mitigating rumination is beneficial. In this conceptual paper, we differentiate reflection from rumination. We also explain how self-tracking technologies may inadvertently lead to rumination and the implications this has for design. Our goal is to expand self-tracking research by discussing these negative cycles and encourage researchers to consider rumination when studying, designing, and promoting tools to prevent adverse unintended consequences among users.

Exploring a Model to Develop Critical Reflective Thought Among Elementary School Math Preservice Teachers

This study focuses on the challenge of promoting significant mathematical discourse among preservice teachers. The study was conducted as part of an academic course that accompanies their practical training. Twenty-three math preservice teachers’ learning process was examined as a result of using an analytic model designed for discourse protocols’ analysis. Findings revealed that an active and dynamic process occurred, modifying teacher practice and developing critical reflective thinking among preservice teachers. The change occurred in two “ripples of influence”: (1) improving discourse to one promoting learning by demonstrating hypothetical scenarios and (2) perception of the role of teachers and class management.

Concentration and Visualization Techniques in Buddhist Meditation

This chapter outlines the early form and development of Buddhist meditation. First, it discusses the “application of mindfulness,” especially “mindfulness of the body,” which can be largely classified into two types of practice. One is “mindfulness per se,” without reflective thought, and the other is a more reflective or visual approach. “Mindfulness per se” (in particular, mindful breathing) was transmitted to East Asia and remains the cardinal method there. The chapter discusses close ties between traditional mindfulness and Japanese Sōtō practice. It then moves on to describe meditation on the decomposition of a corpse, which is a representative form of the more reflective and visual type of practice, involving the observation of a dead body in its stages of decomposition. This is found in early scriptures. Later texts came to teach a more elaborate method of “grasping the images” of a corpse. A notable development in visualization is that the images seen by the practitioner came to include ones that were more enigmatic. The discussion finally turns to another significant development in Buddhist meditation, one which involves Buddha visualization. Its undeveloped form is found in early Mahayana sutras, but a fully developed version employing statues as aides for visualization is found in later meditation texts from the fifth century onward. This type of visualization was inherited by Esoteric Buddhism and is still practiced today.

The Metaphysical Grounding of Logical Operations: John Dewey’s Theory of Qualitative Continuity

In John Dewey’s logical theory, qualities or qualitative relations account for the capacity to distinguish and associate the objects of reflective thought; they are antecedent to reflective analysis and necessary for coherent processes of inquiry. In Dewey’s writings that are specifically “metaphysical” in orientation, he is much more vague about the function of qualities, but does call them “generic traits of existence.” As such, they appear to be central to his mature ontological theory. In order to more fully understand the metaphysical import of qualitative relations, I first examine the details of Dewey’s logical theory, and then generalize those details in accordance with Dewey’s larger theory of nature. The end result is a novel interpretation of Dewey’s metaphysics.

Le rôle de la philosophie de l'éducation dans la formation des maîtres

We cannot talk about the role of philosophy of education in teachers' training programs without examining the relationship between philosophy and educational theories. Even when theoreticians like Kieran Egan, for example, claim that education is a normative discourse that cannot be inferred from "local" empirical psychological research, the role of philosophy seems of utmost importance because philosophy has essentially to do with norms and values. Another way of looking at the "sciences" of education that renews our comprehension of their relationship is by analysing a new cognitive psychological approach named "metacognition" which rests on one's ability to understand one's own cognitive strategies and mechanisms of regulation. The well-known psychologist Adrien Pinard in Quebec has been working on those concepts lately, inspired by Flavell's model of cognitive regulation. This approach is remarkably similar both to Wilson's definition of procedural criteria which he claims educational theory is all about and to the very specific method of philosophy, that of analytical and reflective thought. Philosophy or reflective thought cannot be separated from practice in teacher training since education is not only a matter of pedagogical means but also of attitudes to and relationship with another person. Thus, besides theory and practice, a third parameter should be taken into account in the elaboration of a teacher training program: the meta-practice and theory parameter, or the reflection on one's own practice, which is essentially philosophical.