Work Name 06

Macha - A Critical Design Approach To Privacy Within Dating Applications

2021

Online dating is a prime example of how our modern-day society has adapted to the rapidly growing technology around us. Romance today no longer just signifies romantic gestures of flowers and chocolates but can be stripped back to be as simple as a match on a dating application. Presented is my final year project that takes a deep dive into what online dating exactly means for people, why someone may use a dating application and what the future holds for the online dating world. When I am examining issues that take place, I specifically looked at the dangers and concerns relating to privacy within dating apps.

From analyzing both of the topics of online dating and privacy separately, I wanted to investigate how far I could push these two concepts collectively in my attempt of creating a critical design. From this, I created a booklet containing information about Macha, which was the service I created, a scenario about Macha, designs and the activities to be completed on the day of my workshop sessions. Within these sessions, participants thoroughly discussed all areas of privacy and online dating in which they uncovered the obstacles, truths and issues of technology and the online dating world.

My full final year report can be seen here.

Research

For the first stage of this project, I had to conduct research on the topic of privacy and online dating. I did this in a number of ways. My Literature Review contained 5 headings of the most evident topics seen within the academic papers I read. These include:

Privacy on the Internet
Presentations on Dating Applications
Capabilities of Dating Applications
Current Mobile Applications
Motivation to use Online Dating

During this period of time, I also had to look at the online dating market and the media when looking for inspiration for the project. This ranged from tv shows, documentaries and products available today. Some of these include:

Black Mirror
The Social Dilemma
Speaking Frankly: Dating Apps: CBS Original Documentary
Online Dating Services
Pplkpr

My main form of user research was through interviews. This is an important method of gaining opinions, attitudes, experiences, processes, behaviours, or predictions of what people think of privacy within online dating. My target group for my interviews were both genders and ranging between the ages of 18 to 25 year olds. I tried to find individuals as diverse as possible, this was to ensure I covered the majority of the opinions and feelings of young people that use dating apps. Overall I interviewed 10 individuals, 5 males and 5 females via Microsoft Teams. I also had a variety in the age group I was interviewing, with my youngest participant being 19 years old and my oldest being 25 years old. Themes to arise include:

Safety In Online Dating
Appearance In Online Dating
Online Dating Data Concerns
The Future Of Online Dating
Variety In Dating Applications
Online Dating Culture

I wanted to browse dating forum websites to collect secondary data from posts by participants complaining about and discussing issues in dating applications. I underwent this to improve my understanding of the area even further. I also further investigated privacy-related discussions in online forums to ensure I did not miss out on any additional information that may not be obtained from my interviews. This involved me looking for any worries, discussions, queries or statements relating to online dating, specifically privacy. Themes to arise include:

Privacy Identity Concerns
Scams In Online Dating
Online Dating Data Concerns
Advice For Online Dating

Design Process

Next stage involved transitioning into the design process of my project. It was vital in this stage to address my research I have conducted thus far. I then took the strongest points into consideration by implementing it into my critical design piece that I would bring forward and successfully demonstrate in my workshop.

Before ideating my designs, I created three personas that were based on my research thus far. I had to ensure when creating my personas I covered all many participants' issues and concerns that I have encountered in my research which assisted in the process of creating my design while keeping the user in mind.

After expanding my knowledge on the world of critical and spectacular design, I could begin ideating designs, focusing on the notable points of interest that had the potential to be delved deeper within my workshop.

These are some of the low fidelity wireframes I considered:

The first design I created early on in t

I knew in my ideation progression, I was not completely pleased with how and what I was creating, as it just did not possess the dystopian and shock factor that I desired. To achieve this, I knew I had to modify my ideation approach. The world is an impressive place and there are many technologies available that could be utilized and pushed forward especially in this field of critical design. This is when I shifted my mindset to focus heavily on the scenario I want to present to the user.

When learning more about critical design, I examined Anthony Dunne and Fiona Raby book ‘Speculative Everything” where they talk of scenario design and how it's beneficial in connecting with the user.

Below showcases a mind map of the three main scenarios I created with these challenges in mind. I realised once I created this mind map that I enjoyed aspects from each of the ideas so instead of focusing on one design in particular, I decided to combine elements of all to create my final design.

For my critical design intervention, I created a booklet which was the product given to my participants for the workshop. This booklet contains information about the service I created, a scenario about the service, designs and then questions and activities to be completed on the day of the workshop which includes the research method of an empathy map.

The Product

For my workshop, the most vital aspect for me is evoking conversation through the Macha service and the scenario that surrounds it. But to create a more vivid image of this to the participants, I decided to design a number mockup screens to visualise the Macha application service. As the mobile application is not the most important aspect of this workshop, I did not conduct user testing on the low fidelity prototype before creating high fidelity. I did this because the intention of these designs is to aid the participant to gain more of an insight to the service Macha more so then to use the application itself.

Again, I wanted to include the design of the implant in my workshop worksheet as it is another visual tool for my participants and in turn, makes the scenario more realistic. I selected the logo of Macha as the design of my implant which would be displayed like a tattoo. The logo design presents a cup with a love heart in the centre of this and glows when the implant is active.

Workshop Results

I conducted two workshop sessions in relation to my critical design intervention. Each focus group had a mix of female and male participants. I purposely arranged the groups in this manner to ensure the results remain equal and impartial. All participants signed my ethical consent form and gave me their permission to record the workshop before proceeding. Due to Covid19 restrictions, both sessions took place through group video calls on Microsoft teams and both were approximately an hour long.

Full workshop result break down can be seen in the report linked at the top of this page but here is a short summary of the results presented in a infographic poster below: