Have you ever heard of someone who can empathise easily? Or maybe you have heard someone tell you, “Can you see something from my perspective?”
Empathy is defined as, “the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another’s position.”
When we are designing a product it is important to understand who we are designing a product for and why. That is why we have a step called empathise. In this step we work to fully understand the experience of the user for whom you are designing. We can do this through observation, interaction and immersing ourselves in their experiences.
Let’s practice.
We learned about the Sustainable Development Goals earlier. These goals work with people all over the world, including your own community. Have you noticed any problems in your community? Who does the problem affect and how?
For example, maybe you have noticed not many students in school. In particular, you notice a lot of girls are not attending school. Why are they not attending school? What have you observed? Maybe you could speak to some girls missing school and understand why they miss class.
In your notebook think of your own community, the problems they face, and who specifically.
Let’s Reflect:
What was the problem you thought of? Who is affected by this problem the most and why?