Creating Sustainable Innovation through Design for Behaviour Change

The proposed project will result in the first holistic overview of design for behaviour change as a driver for sustainable innovation. This will provide a basis for developing successful strategies for the effective implementation of sustainable innovation through design for behaviour change by public and private service providers with focus on SMEs.

Design is a significant driver for sustainable innovation, because it is able to realise new insights and perspectives that are people-centred as well as manage uncertainty due to its catalytic multi-disciplinary nature. Recognised for some time, design for behaviour change is as yet lacking an overarching and coherent framework to include ecological, economic and social perspectives and approaches. The best-known area of design for behaviour change currently is sustainable design, followed by design for health and well-being, safety design, and social design. While research has shown significant opportunities, realisation in professional and public contexts is only emerging.

The project brings together a significant inter-disciplinary and multi-institutional network of key national and international academic partners and non-academic stakeholders with an interest in sustainable innovation through design for behaviour change. It will thus bring together two sets of stakeholders: key proponents of design for behaviour change from academic research, and relevant public and private service providers with an interest in facilitating behaviour change through design. This will allow the project uniquely to explore current key approaches to design for behaviour change in a wide range of applications, including safety design, design for health and well-being, and social design.

The investigation will focus on two main areas:

The review of current key models and approaches of design for behaviour change, comprising Design for Sustainable Behaviour Change, Persuasive Technology, Design with Intent, Mindful Design, Socially Responsible Design, Designing out Crime and Design against Crime, amongst others. Including proponents of several of these theories, the network offers the unique opportunity to provide an overarching review that is able to draw out commonalities and differences between the various approaches and practices in the different areas of design for behaviour change. This review will form the basis for establishing a holistic framework that can accommodate and provide strategic co-ordination of the current fragmented approaches.

The project will investigate current understandings, needs and gaps concerning sustainable innovation by public and private service providers, and how to address them more effectively through the use of design for behaviour change. For this purpose, relevant non-academic stakeholders will be engaged firstly through a broad online survey to elicit current knowledge and concerns, and from which secondly relevant interested non-academic stakeholders will be identified and invited to participate in a number of targeted focus group discussions to elicit key data concerning understanding, challenges and opportunities of adopting and implementing design for behaviour change strategies.

The network partners will utilise links into the most important Design Research Networks and Design Business Partnerships to explore the needs and opportunities for using design research to facilitate innovation businesses. In particular, we will focus on how public and private service providers, particularly SMEs, can benefit from this research.

The network will produce a range of strategic outputs including an interactive online project resource, a comprehensive state-of-the-art review of the field drawing on both academic and non-academic stakeholder views and approaches, and an international network on design for behaviour change, using a results workshop and social media to engage and communicate the project results to a broad range of audiences.

The project's impact among non-academic stakeholders will be facilitated firstly throughout the research process itself and secondly through dissemination of project outcomes through appropriate channels. The following audiences will be targeted:
1) public and private service providers and design businesses for whom behaviour change through design could offer new opportunities for sustainable innovation;
2) relevant sector bodies in design, such as the Design Council, who have direct links to relevant service providers and design businesses;
3) policy makers and funders concerned with behaviour change and innovation through design businesses and service providers.

The project's impact activities will include:
- the project website and online resource to facilitate the web-presence of the project and make the project outcomes available to non-academic audiences and stakeholders;
- utilisation and integration of appropriate social media with the website to achieve a broad reach and dissemination to all potentially interested parties;
- the planned online survey will reach a broad non-academic audience and allow for their involvement;
- the planned focus-groups will involve key non-academic stakeholders to exchange and discuss understanding, opportunities and strategies for design for behaviour change;
- liaising with appropriate sector bodies who will also support the project through dissemination to their members;
- publication of the final report and other relevant project materials online, open access to be widely available to academic and non-academic audiences;
- dissemination of relevant findings in form of industry journal articles and participation in industry events to a broad range of relevant non-academic audiences;
- interested non-academic stakeholders will be able to join the DRS Special Interest Group on Behaviour Change to engage in the activities of the network.

All impact activities will be planned and monitored through the scheduled team meetings, and evaluated utilising established processes which are in place in each of the partner institutions.