Month: March 2016

Unexpected Object: The Frisbee – An Unexpected Tool for Survival in the Wilderness

The Frisbee

Typical Associations: fun, entertainment, running, playfulness, wide open spaces, flight, novelty, single purpose, throwaway

Manipulation: The way I chose to manipulate the frisbee was to take it from it’s normal suburban environment, where the presence of many other objects reduces its usefulness to simply being a toy, then bring it into the wilderness, where the absence of objects transforms it from a tool for entertainment into a tool for survival. Among the many uses of the frisbee include – a plate, a vessel for collecting water, fanning the flames of a fire, a hunting tool to distract prey, a food cover, a paddle, shade from the sun, etc.

New Associations: utility, survival, adaptability, flexibility, multi-purpose, essential, ingenuity, creativity

Jason Wen

The process of cognitive mapping guides the user to concretely break down an object into its components and associations. What happens afterward is that the user not only knows WHAT he/she feels towards the object but more importantly WHY he/she has those feelings.

In the example of the prescription bottle, a user may harbor negative feelings towards the bottle e.g. frustration, irritation, etc. By starting with the object rather than the emotion, we get a clearer picture of the path from object to emotion. There may be many different paths between the same object to the same emotion. For example, if the user feels frustration, the path may have originated with the child-proof lid and repeated failures at opening the bottle or with the plastic orange container that is non-degradable and washes ashore on the beach that she spends her family vacations at. But if we probed at the emotion beginning with the emotion, it may be more difficult to pull out one reason from another.

Cognitive mapping can be practiced with every way that we express ourselves. Associations can be created for any signal or stimuli able to be interpreted by the human body. Associations are attached to things we can see, hear, smell, taste, feel. And if associations exist, then cognitive mapping can be practiced to elucidate those connections. So then, cognitive mapping is most useful when we want a very specific user response.

For example, in a job interview, we want to potential employer to attach very specific associations to us, the applicant. If that association is professionalism, then we can practice cognitive mapping on our attire (sight), our interview question responses (audio), handshake (touch).

Jason Wen

The process of cognitive mapping guides the user to concretely break down an object into its components and associations. What happens afterward is that the user not only knows WHAT he/she feels towards the object but more importantly WHY he/she has those feelings.

In the example of the prescription bottle, a user may harbor negative feelings towards the bottle e.g. frustration, irritation, etc. By starting with the object rather than the emotion, we get a clearer picture of the path from object to emotion. There may be many different paths between the same object to the same emotion. For example, if the user feels frustration, the path may have originated with the child-proof lid and repeated failures at opening the bottle or with the plastic orange container that is non-degradable and washes ashore on the beach that she spends her family vacations at. But if we probed at the emotion beginning with the emotion, it may be more difficult to pull out one reason from another.

Cognitive mapping can be practiced with every way that we express ourselves. Associations can be created for any signal or stimuli able to be interpreted by the human body. Associations are attached to things we can see, hear, smell, taste, feel. And if associations exist, then cognitive mapping can be practiced to elucidate those connections. So then, cognitive mapping is most useful when we want a very specific user response.

For example, in a job interview, we want to potential employer to attach very specific associations to us, the applicant. If that association is professionalism, then we can practice cognitive mapping on our attire (sight), our interview question responses (audio), handshake (touch).

Owen Hsiao

For the taste experience, I tried many nine different kind of food and to my surprise all the the items tasted well for me except the vinegar.

The list of the items I tried and my association with them are listed below: Lime, lemon, banana, blueberry, grapefruit, chocolate, vinegar, grape, coffee.

I really enjoyed eating the citric fruits such as lemon, lime, and grapefruit. They tasted very sweet after the berry. These fruits tasted so good that I made me keep going back to get more. Also, it’s really funny how my tongue tasted the sweetness after the berry but the other part of my body are still sensing the sourness in these fruits. For example, although these fruits tasted sweet to me, my facial muscles still couldn’t help to make the sour face. Another thing that is surprising to me is that the food that used to be sweet lost their sweetness after the berry. Fruits such as banana, blueberry, and grape tasted like stale water after I tried the berry. It was really interesting for me. The only item which I couldn’t stand was the apple cider vinegar. It was very sour that I couldn’t stand it.

In sum, this unexpected taste experience is very interesting because the new tastes of these food items allow me to have different associations towards these items. Some of them tasted surprisingly good while other tasted surprisingly stale or unbearable.It’s interesting to have this kind of experiment once in a while to change our perception about certain items. However, if the frequency increases, I think I would get used to the new tastes and the level of surprise will decrease for me. Although, I might still enjoy the sweet taste of the citric fruits.