Stanford d.school

Technology is increasingly an intimate companion, a go-between for our relationships, and a trusted friend helping us to develop new capabilities. Even so, it can be a struggle to live harmoniously with technology. So far, technology’s EQ hasn’t caught up to its IQ. Technology is aligned with productivity, not attuned to our inner world.

Design thinking changed the way we create products by democratizing the tools of design. The process originated at Stanford Design School so imagine how we felt introducing the next iteration of the concept—design feeling. Design thinking focuses on solving problems, design feeling centers on the emotional experience of using a product.

We led a workshop at the school to try out new techniques that combine human emotional intelligence with machine perception to create more empathetic and expressive technology. Through a series of emotional design activities and with the help of affective computing, the group spent the day prototyping the next wave of empathetic companions.