• Research Topics
  • Design Topics
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Frugal Design And Social Innovation

Among many developing countries such as India, there is significant scope for designing products for people living in ‘Marginal Contexts’. These contexts are social scenarios with poor socio-economic conditions where people lack freedom and capabilities. Products that can appropriately meet the aspirational needs of this section of users are typically ‘low-resource intensive’ in their development and usage. The process of developing such products can be called ‘frugal design’.  Projects related to 'frugal design' focus on developing systemic and holistic solutions for marginal contexts.
Potential Topics for Research:
  • Development and testing of Frugal Design Methodologies and Tools for Social and Industrial Organizations.
  • Development of Frugal Engineering and Innovation Methods for implementation in industrial contexts.
  • Understanding Impacts of Frugal Design on Social and Technical contexts.
  • Understanding Designer Behavior and Thinking when they design frugal solutions for marginal contexts.
  • Study of the affect of frugal innovations on marginal context after dissemination.
  • Many others ...

Designing for Children

Designing for children is a unique process. Many of the activities typically conducted are turned on their heads if children are users. For example, how do you perform participatory design which small children? Design processes that engage children have to be developed with significant considerations for child psychology. Details such as product form, materials, usability also follow different rules when designing for children. Research topics in this area can focus on tools for designers to empathise and work with children. We also have a lot to learn about specific problems faced in learning and teaching children in the Indian context. What can be effective interventions for building critical and creative thinking in children? How do we design physical and tangible solutions for playful learning? How do we engage children with emerging technologies and ensure their wellbeing in the digital world?
Potential Topics for Research:
  • Tools and Methodologies for creative development of aides, toys, games and other products for playful learning.
  • Using emerging technologies to design relevant solutions for children and their impact.
  • Implementing design thinking and problem-solving skills in the vernacular educational context and its impact on learning.
  • Implementing participatory design methods for designing with children and its effect on the design process.
  • Pedagogic methods for hands-on learning in the Indian educational context.
  • Digital well-being of children.
  • Many more...

Design for Education

In this subtopic, students can select design problems related to product design, communication design or interaction design. Problems can be explored from the perspective of children, parents or teachers. Other user groups that can be considered when identifying design problems include teenagers, caregivers, school staff and administrators. Students can develop teaching/learning aids, toys, games, interactive products or other experimental solutions.
Topics for Design Projects:
  • Designing toys, games, educational aids and other products for teaching specific subjects in schools.
  • Redesigning school equipment.
  • Design products to improve teacher-child interactions in classrooms
  • Designing products for improving critical and creative thinking in children.
  • Design for building community/reducing bullying/social development in teenage children within educational establishments.
  • Many others ...

Inclusive Design

Designers are sometimes unaware that they bake their assumptions about users into their products. A video game controller assumes you have two hands, A phone app assumes you can see, a gym equipment assumes you have strength in all appendages. Designing products, services, and applications equally suited for all types of users, or those that bring equity between all users, is called inclusive design. The domain is vast, and design problems can be explored considering a wide range of users, e.g., People with momentary or permanent disabilities, Geriatric, Caregivers, Nurses or by looking at how specific professions can be made more inclusive.
Topics for Design Projects:
  • Designing products for rehabilitation, support or ease for people with permanent or incidental disabilities.
  • Developing specific tools for supporting professionals with disability in their jobs.
  • Designing teaching aides, games and toys for blind children.
  • Designing tools for empathizing with people with disabilities or to simulate specific disabilities.
  • Designing products for rehabilitation and training after sports injuries.
  • Designing products for caregivers and nurses.
  • Many more…

Digital Wellbeing

Our health and mental wellbeing today strongly depend on our digital lives. Both groups of people – ones who have transitioned to a highly digital world & ones who were born into it – have their own sets of issues to deal with. Where for an old person, the issue may be to understand digital communication; for children, it is the adverse effect of their digital presence on their daily lives. How can designers develop solutions to create a more harmonious interaction with digital objects without affecting their wellbeing? This is what this subtopic pertains to.
Topics for Design Projects:
  • Design for Digital wellbeing of children and Teenagers.
  • Design for building habits and health
  • Interventions for community building in young adults
  • Interventions for cautious media consumption in children
  • Interventions for understanding digital security and privacy in the Indian context.
  • Many more…