Collaborative Research: SoD-TEAM: 'Values at Play: Integrating Ethical and Political Factors into System Design'

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Title: "Collaborative Research: SoD-TEAM: Values at Play - Integrating Social Factors into Design"The focus of this project is on the development of a software design methodology, titled "Values at Play (VAP)" that takes values into account when developing software systems. The methodology, or set of best practices, addresses such issues as: how values can be consistently and systematically integrated into the design of software systems, how values investigations, in the context of technical design, can be made scientifically rigorous, and, the construction of a viable set of general software design principles that could lead to the integration of values across a variety of design tasks. The VAP project integrates the humanities, the arts, and social, and ethical interests into the scientific design of technological systems by specifically focusing on values in the design of games. The project involves three research activities including: 1. Development of a rigorous methodology (or, best practices) for supporting value conscious design; a handbook of the Values at Play methodology is made available in hardcopy and on the Web. This phase explores such issues as: how to identify values that might be relevant to a given design project, how to embody or express values in system design, how to engage in appraisal of whether and to what extent designers have successfully embedded target values in a given system. 2. Development of a values-in-design toolkit which includes: a) game building components to help students create games based on a values-orientation; and b) several working examples demonstrating values-to-design-feature correlations. 3. Assessment of design training interventions: the team will design several instruments to assess the values integration in the methodology and Toolkit. In addition to the research activities, this project engages faculty and practitioners in a Workshop about Values at Play. Embedding values within technological systems, and verifying that such systems actually reflects those values, is particularly appropriate using computer games since they affect larger society. This research will also be of use to educators and systems designers in the IT field considering game structures in their approaches as well as to scholars interested in the study of technology, society, and humanity. Potentially, this project might advance this line of inquiry to a pervasive, industry changing, international level of importance which not only promotes the humanistic study of these issues but enhances real products for real people.Program Manager: Anita J. La SalleDate: July 12, 2006