User Study of Homeless

User Study “ the System” Laura Brunetti Kshitiz Anand Vignesh Ramesh

Overview
Study type and Rationale
Goal
Strategies and Methods
Who?
Why?
How?
What?
Observations
Insights
Reflections

Study Type: Fly-on-the-wall
Insights from our focus group
Varying points of view on the topic.
Addressing any one or a combination of the core issues will help alleviate the symptom of homelessness.
The current support system is flawed
Homelessness is a topic that makes some people uncomfortable.
Homelessness is not my problem.

“ The System”
Official – services and organizations.
Visible, tangible, defined missions and goals, statistics.
Social – general “everyday” social interactions, public/societal view
Intangible, not well defined
Study Type: Fly-on-the-wall

Goal
“ What is the system’s role in homelessness?”
Specifically the unspoken public view and interaction.
What people actually do
vs . what they think they do/would do.

Who?
General population and homeless around city
Why?
Hardest to define. Organizations have defined mission and goals.
How? Where?
Environments
Major downtown areas (streets & parks), homeless aid centers.
Activities (interactions)
General population & homeless
Aid center workers & homeless
Homeless & homeless

What?
Non-verbal communication
body language
Reaction
Verbal communication

Observations (Results)
General population & homeless
People did not approach the homeless. Interactions were initiated by a homeless person.
No physical touch. Eye contact established.
Conversation limited to homeless asking for something (mainly money), homeless were rejected.

Aid center workers & homeless
Aid workers did approach homeless (after homeless entered shelter).
No physical touch. Eye contact established.
Conversation expands beyond simply asking for something. Mostly surface level “How’s it going?”

Homeless & homeless
Often traveled alone.
Congregated at specific locations and times.
Physical touch-hugs, hand shakes.
Called each other by their names. Eye contact established.
Conversation about emotions (“pumped up and smiling”) and social activities (“I got cash. We can go out today.”) and ‘serious’ things (a place to live, roommates, security deposits)

Insights
Sense of community among homeless.
General population feel no responsibility, because no sense of community with homeless
take no action.
take no time to learn about resources.
Shelters freely give material needs and occasionally people may give money/food, therefore homeless may not be motivated to acquire on own what can get from shelter.

Reflections
Longer periods of observation.
Difficult to completely understand a person’s motivations/logic behind their actions.
Use of professional equipment.
Different observations for the same event vs. Observations for different events.

User Study of Homeless

by Kshitiz Anand on Feb 06, 2009

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