Reflection on Tutorial 24 3 08

A little Upset...

Reflection on Tutorial 18 3 08

A Design Problem: The Influence of Student Accommodation on Suicide among University Students

Suicide on university campuses is shooting up, and this phenomenon has led to conversations and discussions among people, but all the talks of numbers and patterns still leave us with the ques-tion: "Why do the students take their own lives?" The most common factor is mental illness, in particular, "mood disorders", such as phobia, paranoia, hypochondria, clinical depression and manic-depressive illness, also known as bi-polar disorder.

Mental problems have drawn attention from the government, society and universities as the number of suicide cases on campuses have grown alarmingly. National support system towards suicide on campus has been established in many countries. Besides, the counseling and mental health centre, most of the universities have set up a warning and intervention mechanism to supplement psychiatric counseling, especially focusing on suicide prevention on campus.

However, a hidden risk factor which is significantly associated with the possibility of suicide among university students hasn’t been detected by the government, society, and/or universities. The design of student accommodation in universities should be considered as an important point, which may precipitate depression or escalate the level of mental illness. A number of suicide cases, which have happened in student dorms highlights that there are some problems with the design of student accommodation and perhaps should be taken into account as a subversive in campus suicide.

Subversive

Poor student accommodation design can be classified into three categories.s
1. Surroundings. A number of universities are located in suburbs or far away from town centres, understandably their student hall developments are situated close by, which is convenient for the students to access between their dorms and campus. But some characteristics of an urban location can possibly cause depression in students.

A. The shortage of entertainment in suburban districts may induce feelings of a sense of dullness. It is difficult for students to get rid of their tension through the limited facilities, and always living under pressure without any form of release may cause depression and other mental illnesses.

B. Lack of company and poor public transport also decrease the possibility of social communication between students. Taking part in city centre activities requires the students to go out of their way, therefore they may opt to stay in their rooms.

C. With the exception of watching DVDs and playing computer games, the only entertainment for students appears to be peer parties, but the two popular problems with these parties are alcohol and drug abuse. These are other high suicide risk factors, more than half of all suicides involve drugs or alcohol.

2. Layout and interior design. Common features of the student flat are small, crowded, and low. These interiors also have uniform layout, poor colour coordination, dull furniture and framework. This is all very monotonous and depressing to those who are more vulnerable.

Black, white, gray, dark blue and some other cool colours are extensively utilized in student accommodation, because these colours look clean, tidy and steady. But from the psychological perspective, a negative influence on people’s mood can be generated when living in an environment with these colours together.

Psychologists believe warm colours like red, yellow and orange can enhance people’s mood and make people happy; contrary to this, dark blue, gray, brown and other cool colours can make people quiet, even depressed. Black and white are two extreme colours, many surveys show that black can distract people’s attention, and make people upset, empty, desperate and depressed. When living in such an environment for a long time, pupils of the eyes will be enlarged, therefore people will be getting more and more detached; in addition, their health and wellbeing will be influenced. However, although white is clean and can calm people down, living in an environment such as this for long periods can lead to the pupils of the eyes shrinking because of the strong contact with white light, and it will cause headaches and nervous debility.

Wayne Liao, a graduate student of Lancaster University, who lived in a student hall when he was studying in Grizedale College of Lancaster, said: “my flatmates and I couldn’t stay in our rooms for more than three days, the black doors, the ceilings, and the white walls of the flat almost drove us mad. But if we were to go out, it usually took us 2 hours to get to the city centre area, and at least 40 minutes by bus to the nearest supermarket. So, compared to going out, we’d rather stay in our flat, drinking and taking drugs to release our depression. Once when I spent my Christmas holiday in our flat alone, I really felt suicidal. To have such a feeling is horrible, and I don’t even want to recall it.”


Students who lived in a flat of student hall in Lancaster University were sitting and drinking in their flat’s corridor, in order to release their depression.


Samantha Dong, a graduate student of Loughborough University talked about one of her flatmate’s death in the student flat of Loughborough University. “When we found her body, it was several days after her death. It was a devastating scene. She died in her bath room. Nobody knew she had died until someone noticed a flow of water coming out from her room through a crack between her door and the floor. There was also an unusual smell. No one knew how she died. People said maybe she died from sudden illness like heart attack or etc., but no one can give us a satisfying answer. This happened several years ago, but I still believe she died from suicide. A week before her death, she told me she felt like she was living in a cell; dark, cramped, and silent. I know she was very anxious about her study, because she couldn’t focus on studying in her room that felt like it is a cell. I can understand and relate to how she struggled with her studies, life conditions, and mental troubles.”

Student flat of Loughborough University. Too much white may lead to feelings of tenseness nervousand can cause mental illness.

3. Supports and services. This is a service design problem. Most universities haven’t built support services for students living in campus accommodations, such as neighbourhood facilities (for entertainment, sport, communication and study), and it is necessary to run workshops for staff to develop appropriate attitudes and working ways when dealing with student matters.Poor supports and services might make students more frustrated with their accommodation, and it may also be a trigger for depression. Alternatively, investment in the infrastructure and services of university will decrease the possibility of student’s depression, which is influenced by the poor design of their rooms.

Time to Intervene

Suicide leaves a wide path of destruction: they not only harm themselves but those they care for most around them. In Nancy O'Malley's book, ‘Suicide on Campus’, James Rhem states, "Suicide hurts us all. When a student kills himself in a dorm, the whole campus is affected. His fellow students, his teacher, his resident advisor all feel the loss in some way or another. It challenges each of them, each of us. Clearly, we must work together against suicide not just for the sake of the victims but for all our sakes."

It is time to highlight the importance of the living environment of students as a crucial factor, which may lead to the suicide of university students. Hence psychologists, designers, architects, and sociologist should collaborate together, to clarify this problem and tackle it as soon as possible.

Logos I designed for Our Magazine 'Spark'

I don't know why when I uploaded these pictures on the Internet, their colour changed, maybe because I transfered their format from AI. to JPEG. so they look strange, but anyway they have nice colours in my computer.

Other graphic design team members' logo

My Space in Our Studio

An Email from Mike

From: Mike Press Sunday - March 2, 2008 10:29 PM
To: Jia Cui
CC: Hazel White", "Qin Han"
Subject: Re: Tutorial notes


Hi Michelle

Thank you for your tutorial notes.

I thought that it would be useful to clarify one or two points, just to make sure we have no misunderstandings.

I'm pleased with your thinking on this project, and the dedicated approach that you have taken. At our last meeting we considered the two broad approaches you could take:
(i) a communications design project that considered aspects of non-verbal communication that may assist in identifying people of high risk, especially in an A+E context;
(ii) a critical design project that focused on suicide. From our discussion it was clear that approach;
(ii) better suited your strengths and aspirations, and I'm most pleased that you took the initiative to contact Graham, whose email to you raised some interesting issues and creative strategies.

As long as you keep uppermost the ethical and sensitive nature of your subject matter, then you should explore this more fully. Essentially you are looking at how design can raise debate and awareness - creating objects that have a 'mediating' value - in other words, a value and function in being a focus for discussion and discourse.

I suggested that the work of artists Dalziel (pronounced "Dayell") and Scullion could be worth looking at in detail. They are not PhD students, but rather two of Scotland's leading contemporary artists who have a base in our College. Their website is here: http://www.dalzielscullion.com/ They use art to raise debate about our relationship with nature.

Your project will require you to look at the variety of ways that graphic design can connect with social issues, but to focus on 'critical design' as one approach that you will develop and evaluate in the specific context of suicide. Some of the variety of ways are these:

1. Advertising campaigns - I showed you a campaign directed at victims of domestic violence.
2. Subversive approaches to the advertising style - eg: Adbusters, which is online and in the library.
3. Information systems to help people to get help or assistance easily, or to provide assistance in a counselling or clinical context.
4. Critical design

You may wish to talk to Jonathan Baldwin briefly, as he is a specialist on visual communication.
A good example of 3. above is 'Living in the Moment' - http://www.computing.dundee.ac.uk/projects/lim/LIMWeb_28feb_01.swf - which our colleague Gary Gowans in graphics has been working on. This is a system to help families who have family members with dementia.

We can have another discussion about this on Tuesday.

Mike

Professor Mike Press
Head of School
School of Design
Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design
University of Dundee
Perth Road
Dundee DD1 4HT

Reflection on Tutorial 03 3 08

Yeah, I need to research tons of examples on advertising campaign, because this is what I want to do for my project and will be one of my project outputs.

Actually what Qin suggexted me to think about is just the proper question I need to answer in my research paper. It is difficult to explain now because I don't have enough evidence which supports me to claim my point, and I also really don't know what is my point, sad...

The story telling idea is an interesting idea, especially different ways of story telling. To be honest sometimes I thought about critical design and would like to give it a adjective word: ridiculous. However I neglect that the word 'ridiculous' can be paraphased as 'humor', just similar to the caricature - makes people thinking after their laughing. Maybe I can think about a comedy way to do my critical design instead of very serious expression. I'd like to watch that movie to get some inspirations.

A Decision

I've skimed the book 'Design Nior' and 'Hertizian Tales', and I also searched on the Internet, now I get to know what is critical design and who does it. But still confused about how can I generate my idea in a critical design way and how can I make my design works critically.

Today I wrote an abstract of my research paper, I decided to explore how can graphic design be involved into critical design, in another word, how to do a critical graphic design. My idea came from my raw understanding of critical design. When read or searched on the Internet, I found it almost all the critical design is expressed by the way of product design, interaction and electronic product, and I couldn't find any critical design expressing in a graphic design way. This made me alittle surprised, because graphic design - a very board and practical design field which can be expressed in almost any ways, but why there is no information about critical graphic design, this is really a sas thing. As a graphic designer and a fan of graphic design, I decided to explore the way that graphic design might be translated in critical design. Actually in my opinion any forms of design can be translated into critical design such as enviornment design, interior design, texile design, even fashion design. So why don't I go through the multi-discipline and have a look how every kinds of design were translated into critical design, and how they work, in order to light up my idea in my project.

I think maybe there are some designers have adopted graphic design in the critical design, but I don't know yet, so I need to do more researches and literature review on my specific problem. Hope I can create a new fads of critical design.

Books I'm Reading