Visualising as a research technique
When you’re trying to learn about a person’s perspective on an experience, a visual exercise like drawing is a more engaging way for people to articulate what the experience feels like, and for you to build empathy.
The Draw your Experience research activity is a way to gather more rich information from stakeholders than a standard survey or interview. It’s essentially a conversation between you and a person who is involved in the experience you are trying to make better or just understand. Patterns can be represented as a cognitive empathy map.
1. Write a prompt at the top of each sheet:
(a) Draw your experience with _____ that was _____ [positive: helpful, great, effective, inspiring].
(b) Draw your experience with _____ that was _____ [negative: tiring, bad, discouraging, unhelpful]
2. Spend 20 minutes walking through the exercise with one member. If you can, give the person participating in the activity the sheets in advance so they can draw on their own. It should take 5-10 minutes to complete the drawings.
3. Take notes, including ve
atim quotes, during the activity.
4. After you complete the activity with one participant, immediately record de
ief notes.
5. Once you’ve done the activity with all your stakeholders, synthesize what you learned using an empathy map or journey map.
Critically discuss this method. What e
ors could occur at each step? What assumptions are being made? How could you evaluate the reliability and validity of this method?