Motivating Weightloss (via Unpressable Buttons and Gizmodo)
This brilliant example of Awareness being used to motivate behaviour comes via Unpressable Buttons and Gizmodo. This follows nicely on the back of my last post which outlined my current research – building on Keller’s ARCS Model of Motivational Design - applying it to product and service design. I am hoping to assemble a nice collection of examples of user’s Awareness being heightened and used as a motivational tool to engage with a product or service (in this case a Dutch gym). This will in turn outline examples of how designers are currently conciously or unconciously motivating (or demotivating) users or non-users of their products and services.
Of course it could be argued that any billboard or advertisement at such a bus stop might be sucessful in encouraging AWARENESS of the product or service it is promoting. However, what makes this distinct is the fact that it responds to or interacts with the user. Such interactivity or user engagement adjusting the information the advertisement presents to make it RELEVANT to the user. It is this that makes it a significant demonstration of motivational design in action.
Would it work though? Whilst undoubtedly it is designed to give people a nudge (specifically a social nudge) by advertising their weight to the public. My instinct is that the only people who would remain sitting in the seat upon realising what is happening would be those who are quite happy with their weight anyway i.e. those who already possess a high degree of self-confidence (and possibly a gym membership!) That is not to say that the nudge wouldn’t therfore work, just that a negative nudge (embarassing someone) might not be the best way to empower your users. What do you reckon – would it work for you? Have you experienced examples of advertising such as this?
If you have you seen anything like this recently I’d love to hear from you and add it to what I hope will become a large and interesting collection of Motivational Design in action.
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Tags: ARCS Model, Human Centred Design, Motivation, Motivational Design, Nudge, Product Design, Public Engagement, Service Design, Social Nudge