Session: DAC-12-01 Engineering for Global Development

Paper Number: 71835

Start Time: August 17, 03:20 PM

71835 - Open Research Questions for Incorporating Multi-Stakeholder Interests in Engineering for Global Development 

There is potential for multi-stakeholder social impact design approaches to help advance design and modeling processes in engineering for global development. Adding multiple stakeholders, however, raises questions about how to choose stakeholders, weight their preferences, and ultimately model the perceived or actual impacts of products on stakeholders. While methods for handling the interests of multiple stakeholders exist in the literature, they are not without problems that are often exacerbated when modeling a product's social impact in an engineering for global development setting. The purpose of this paper is to articulate some of the challenges that product designers encounter for handling multiple stakeholder interests during the process of designing engineering for global development products. These challenges were learned through in-depth interviews with 8 product designers and researchers who have experience in engineering for global development. Along with the challenges, 16 research questions are presented based on existing literature and opportunities for other researchers to contribute. Once these challenges are overcome and more research is conducted, product designers will be able to estimate an engineering for global development product's social impact during the product development process. This will allow them to make improvements to a product's social impact through the deliberate changing product parameters that influence its social impact.

Presenting Author: Phillip Stevenson Brigham Young University

Authors:

Phillip D. Stevenson Brigham Young University
Amy E. Wood Brigham Young Universiry
Chris A. Mattson Brigham Young University
John L. Salmon Brigham Young University