BRIDGING THE DIGITAL DIVIDE: THE POWER OF HUMAN-CENTERED EXPERIENCE

Design Thinking is a problem-solving method that focuses on human-centered experiences while incorporating creativity. The unique approach to design concentrates on building a product or service for consumers that provides user benefits through sensations such as surprise and delight. Warby Parker’s Home-Try-On program is an example of an approach that caters heavily to providing its customers with the best human-centered experience. This free-of-charge program enables customers to search for new eyewear, try on up to five different styles of lenses—either virtually or at home—and make a comfortable, confident selection.

The challenge of bridging the digital divide is a project that can benefit from implementing strategies that concentrate on optimizing the human-centered experience. While digital access, skills, and literacies are all major contributors to the digital divide, another significant component is the lack of inclination among users to participate in digital contexts and communities. An individual’s desire to engage in digital activity can be influenced by factors such as an understanding of user benefits, perceived need for participation, and smooth navigability. By adjusting the scope of focus from simply raising technological awareness to covering human-centered experience, we can address how focus on more redeeming engagement can help influence users to want to participate.

A study conducted by Cochin Hospital and Paris Descartes University examined the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) among participants from ages 63-88. One of the key findings of the study was an initial resistance toward the ICTs. Moderators of each focus group encouraged participants to convey their opinions about the product’s advantages and disadvantages, how easy it was to use, and what they would use the product for. By providing the participants the opportunity to speak about the products and their viewpoints of technology for older people, some of them experienced a feeling of empowerment. When reflecting on her experience as part of the study, one participant shared, “I hope that people who design new technologies will take into consideration what the elderly talk about instead of conceiving things that they find formidable...that in reality are not at all adapted to older people” and that, by doing so, “it allows a mutual enrichment” (Wu et al. 2015).

Understanding critical factors of the digital divide, such as the need for more encouraging and user-friendly technologies, provides us with a place to start in achieving this sense of mutual enrichment. By recognizing, understanding, and accommodating users’ needs, we as a society possess the power to decrease the digital divide by fostering a stronger human-centered experience.

Reference:

Wu, Y. H., Damnee, S., Kerherve, H., Ware, C., & Rigaud, A.S. (2015). Bridging the digital divide in older adults: a study from an initiative to inform older adults about new technologies. Clinical Interventions in Aging, 2015 (10), 193-201.