Thesis

Designing for the lived experience of time

 
 

Visually representing time as a means for students to disincentivize procrastination

3-D representation of thesis interface, where users can navigate spatially to understand how far they are from a study or rest session.
 
 

A 3-D representation of an interface depicting how perception of time is influenced by depth. The user can navigate within the space and physically feel how far a study or rest session is in relation to where they currently are in space.

 
 
 

Research Question

How can the design of a multimodal digital interface facilitate a sense of progression for undergraduates experiencing difficulty in balancing course work to moderate procrastination by adopting a future time perspective?


Abstract

Procrastination has remained a pervasive issue within the academic context. This is further exacerbated in the Covid-19 pandemic, which highlights a need for students to successfully adapt to online asynchronous course environments. However, few studies exist that explore alternative temporal representations of scheduling to bolster motivation and orient students to a future time perspective during task planning and execution. This investigation reframes time perception to help college students mitigate self-regulatory failure by including multiple perspectives and explorations of the relational aspects of time within a 3D environment. Beyond procrastination, this investigation points to the exciting design possibility of tackling recurring issues through slight shifts in perspective.