Gene Lu

In his book, "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat", Oliver Sacks presents some of the clinical tales that he has encountered during his career as a neurologist. Specifically, he discusses patients with losses (e.g. amnesia, Korsakov's Syndrome), which is then contrasted later in the book by patients with excesses (e.g. Tourette's Syndrome, Cupid's Disease). Finally, Dr. Sacks goes off the beaten path of neurological discourse and dives into the topic of transports (e.g. reminiscence, altered perceptions).

In these varying forms of pathologies, there is one common idea shared amongst most, if not all, of the patients; the lack of an inner narrative. Without an inner narrative, patients are unable to maintain an identity or to lead a continous, fulfilling life.

Recently, I've been reading Oliver Sacks' The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and came across a very inspirational story about a Mr. MacGregor, 93 year old man at an old people's home who, with the help of Dr. Sacks and others, prototyped a device that helped to straighten tilting patients.

In the story that follows, there are numerous parallels that can be drawn between the processes that Dr. Sacks and Mr. MacGregor went through with those that are practicing interaction design. Enjoy!

Before arriving into Shanghai, I wasn't really sure what to expect of the elderly and their lifestyle here in the big city. All I had was my experience with a nursing home in Queens, the Keystone Project, and my past experience living with my grandmother. After a few weeks of readjusting myself to the new environment, I had some time to do some preliminary research for my thesis project.

Bare with me, but the following might be a bit general. I'm purposely leaving room for myself to budge around as I come up with more ideas over the summer.

According to recent medical studies, dementia can be prevented or slowed down through lifestyle changes such as an increase in socialization and mental exercises. For my final thesis, I am going to explore a variety of artifacts that will help promote a more social life and increase mental acuity for senior citizens living in nursing homes. These artifacts will specifically address the continued relationship between a senior citizen and their family members by creating an ecosystem that facilitates this relationship through meaningful interactions.

As the semester was coming to an end, we had set our eyes on a working prototype that would provide users with an accurate experience of interacting with the Airloom. Prior to jumping into production, we had set up checkpoints to help us reach our, what seemed at the time, almost impossible goal.

We presented our updated user journey demonstrating how our digital photo frame was the key access point to the Airloom as well as a medium to displaying photos. We also included interactions not mentioned in the previous user journey. Afterwards, we were challenged by our teachers, Robert Fabricant, Clay Weidemann, and Joshua Musick to move beyond the digital photo frame.

There are many variables that determine the finishing times of marathon runners. Some variables are fixed (e.g. elevation) while others cannot be controlled (e.g. temperature, wind speed). This infographic explores the relationship between finishing time and temperature within the past ten years of the New York City Marathon.

In Jill Nussbaum's Design for Public Spaces class, we were given the task of enhancing the experience of the already powerful High Line through a networked, mobile, or interactive installation.