This pictorial presents an accessible workshop format titled “Living Collage”, which explores “livingness” in biodesign with non-specialists. As a research through design approach, grounded in embodied making, 8 participants collaboratively create living artefacts and discuss their implications for the field of biodesign, by using enlarged Petri dishes with an agar base, local natural materials, and printed images. Through the use of atmosphere and multi-sensory cues, a regular classroom is transformed to carry the feeling of working with something living, and a speculative narrative, along with related verbal semantic stimuli, guides the making process. The workshop was documented through photography and observation, which display curiosity, dialogical making, and reflection. The collective discussion was audio-recorded, transcribed, and manually coded by clustering emergent terms into a vocabulary map. Among others, the findings bring up themes around locality, crafts, and relation, but also show tension in themes of discomfort, control, and questions around safety.

This study presents the “P-Heroes”, a superhero family designed through a Research through Design process to support children with urinary incontinence. Inspired by children’s own superhero drawings, expert input, and validation sessions with children, the design evolved through iterative prototyping. Each hero embodies traits such as persistence, comfort, emotional regulation, resilience and structure. Together, the “P-Heroes” reflect the diversity of children’s journeys toward continence and serve as a playful conversation starter to help them express their needs and experiences more openly.

This study investigates how structured co-design approaches foster team mental models (TMMs) sharedness in interdisciplinary design teams engaged in information visualization projects. Interdisciplinary collaboration faces challenges including communication barriers, diverse domains and complex informational environments that hinder shared understanding and cohesion. Drawing from literature on team mental models, team cognition and co-design practices, the study formulates four research questions related to specific interventions, integrative activities, evocative artifacts, framing guides and guided reflexivity. An exploratory mixed-methods approach involved two design teams through brainsketching workshops, with one experiencing structured co-design interventions and an unfacilitated group without interventions. Data analysis integrated qualitative verbal protocol coding with quantitative transition matrices to capture sequential interaction patterns. Chi-square analysis revealed distinct behavioral patterns, with the intervention group exhibiting richer communicative sequences. Findings reveal that integrative activities enhanced early team integration and supported divergent thinking. Evocative artifacts facilitated semantic alignment and novel idea development, while framing guides helped establish adaptive decision-making. Guided reflexivity encouraged procedural strategies around complex problem spaces. The unfacilitated group experienced difficulties, particularly in task framing and reflection processes. This research contributes a procedural framework mapping verbal activity types to team cognition stages, offering approaches for fostering TMMs in interdisciplinary design contexts.

In times of crisis, such as pandemics or social injustice, people often talk about the importance of solidarity, standing together for a common cause. However, this term, while powerful, can sometimes leave people out, especially those who do not fit neatly into shared identities or experiences. Our paper examines how the concept of solidarity can unintentionally exclude individuals, obscure power disparities, or even be exploited by political or corporate interests. Rather than abandoning the concept, we suggest adding a new term: convergence. This word captures the idea of people coming together from different backgrounds to work towards shared goals, without needing to be the same or agree on everything. By combining solidarity with convergence, we can build more inclusive, transparent, and dynamic ways of working together in today’s complex world. This shift in language may help us navigate global challenges more fairly and collaboratively.

Engagement of vulnerable groups in co-creation has attracted growing scholarly and policy interest. Most research, however, focuses on the public sector, and less is known about the factors that support co-creation with these groups in the third sector. This study explores the role of non-profit leadership in engaging refugees in co-creation through volunteering. It draws on evidence from Veiviser—an NGO-initiated project in Bergen (Norway)—where refugees co-create their integration services by volunteering alongside established immigrants and Norwegian-born volunteers. The findings suggest that engaging vulnerable groups in co-creation in the third sector may be easier because of its voluntary nature and the gatekeeping role of non-profit leaders in a selection process that favors people who are more motivated to participate and capable of doing so. The findings also reveal that creating an environment conducive to participation is critical, requiring leadership commitment to building trust, creating a safe space for participation, fostering equality, and empowering refugee participation. Several leadership tactics for achieving these goals are identified, and implications for practice and theory are discussed.

This article assesses a 10-month co-created universal school-based mental health (SBMH) promotion initiative for adolescents (10–19). The study combined quantitative and qualitative components. Pre- and post-intervention surveys were conducted in four schools in Tanzania (n = 400 baseline, 488 endline, with 100 intervention participants at both) and eight schools in Vietnam (n = 1,036 baseline, 893 endline and 436 in panel). In each country, ~90 qualitative interactions (interviews and focus groups) were held at baseline and endline with adolescents, parents, teachers and service providers (total = ~180). In Tanzania, multivariate analysis indicated significant gains among intervention participants relative to peers. Emotional literacy rose 9.5% (p = 0.007; d = 0.57). Attitudes toward help-seeking (p = 0.021; d = 0.50) and prosocial behaviors (p = 0.043, d = 0.38) also improved Active coping increased 15.6% (p = 0.006; d = 0.55). In Vietnam, emotional literacy increased 5.3% (p = 0.012, η2 = .019), and positively, emotion-focused coping declined 14.4% (p = 0.032, η2 = .015). Qualitative evidence reinforces these findings, and suggested spillover effects for nonparticipants. Overall results indicate that co-created universal SBMH initiatives can improve adolescent well-being and offer viable alternatives to limited adolescent-focused mental health services in LMICs.

Collaborative design (co-design) is a team effort fostered through the creative involvement of all participants in co-creative collaboration (co-creation). This new approach to design as a creative social activity heightens the need to study the interpersonal aspects of creativity. Though co-creation has become widely used in recent years, few studies focus on its dynamics, which emerge from intense interactions created by the shared subjectivities of participants in an intersubjective environment. The management and enhancement of interpersonal factors can help create this shared environment by leading the process from personal to interpersonal creativity. Some of these interpersonal factors could be measured by observing the data of biosignals that are used as social cues, particularly if studied in comparison with the data of one of the partners of the social interaction, thanks to the synchrony rate between these datasets. This synchrony of biosignals related to shared behaviours can be associated with the interactive level dynamics that occur during co-creation in team of two (pairwork). This study presents the results of an experiment where biosignal synchrony results were compared to subjective feedback regarding the interactive level to understand the dynamics of the interaction. The results suggest the possibility of using the synchrony rate measured by the Damerau- Levenshtein distance (Ld) or dynamic time warping method (DTW) to approximate the dynamics of the interactive level in co-creative pairwork. This study will contribute to our understanding of the influence of the socio-cognitive process on interactions during co-creation to improve the co-creative design process.

The emergence of large language models (LLMs) provides an opportunity for AI to operate as a co-ideation partner during the creative processes. However, designers currently lack a comprehensive methodology for engaging in co-ideation with LLMs, and there is a limited framework that describes the process of co-ideation between a designer and ChatGPT. This research thus aimed to explore how LLMs can act as codesigners and influence creative ideation processes of industrial designers and whether the ideation performance of a designer could be improved by employing the proposed framework for co-ideation with custom GPT. A survey was first conducted to detect how LLMs influenced the creative ideation processes of industrial designers and to understand the problems that designers face when using ChatGPT to ideate. Then, a framework which based on mapping content to guide the co-ideation between humans and custom GPT (named as Co-Ideator) was promoted. Finally, a design case study followed by a survey and an interview was conducted to evaluate the ideation performance of the custom GPT and framework compared with traditional ideation methods. Also, the effect of custom GPT on co-ideation was compared with a non-artificial intelligence (AI)-used condition. The findings indicated that if users employed co-ideation with custom GPT, the novelty and quality of ideation outperformed by using traditional ideation.

Within the broad context of design research, joint attention within co-creation represents a critical component, linking cognitive actors through dynamic interactions. This study introduces a novel approach employing deep learning algorithms to objectively quantify joint attention, offering a significant advancement over traditional subjective methods. We developed an optimized deep learning algorithm, YOLO-TP, to identify participants’ engagement in design workshops accurately. Our research methodology involved video recording of design workshops and subsequent analysis using the YOLO-TP algorithm to track and measure joint attention instances. Key findings demonstrate that the algorithm effectively quantifies joint attention with high reliability and correlates well with known measures of intersubjectivity and co-creation effectiveness. This approach not only provides a more objective measure of joint attention but also allows for the real-time analysis of collaborative interactions. The implications of this study are profound, suggesting that the integration of automated human activity recognition in co-creation can significantly enhance the understanding and facilitation of collaborative design processes, potentially leading to more effective design outcomes.

Data for Policy (dataforpolicy.org), a global community, focuses on policy–data interactions by exploring how data can be used for policy in an ethical, responsible, and efficient manner. Within its journal, six focus areas, including Data for Policy Area 1: Digital & Data-driven Transformations in Governance, were established to delineate the evolving research landscape from the Data for Policy Conference series. This review addresses the absence of a formal conceptualization of digital and data-driven transformations in governance within this focus area. The paper achieves this by providing a working definition, mapping current research trends, and proposing a future research agenda centered on three core transformations: (1) public participation and collective intelligence; (2) relationships and organizations; and (3) open data and government. The paper outlines research questions and connects these transformations to related areas such as artificial intelligence (AI), sustainable smart cities, digital divide, data governance, co-production, and service quality. This contribution forms the foundational development of a research agenda for academics and practitioners engaged in or impacted by digital and data-driven transformations in policy and governance.

The concept of a socially sustainable society is linked to the notion of equal access to high-quality welfare services and an equitable distribution of common resources. The rationale behind the introduction of private actors to provide welfare services is that greater choice will result in higher quality of service for individuals, achieved through a co-creation process. The purpose of this study is to examine the processes through which value is co-created when elderly are admitted to retirement homes. The study answers the following questions: (1) how do individual expectations differ between the applicants? and (2) how do the employees take the applicants’ expectations into account when allocating the resources available? This study, conducted between november and december 2014, combines surveys with elderly who apply for a retirement home and interviews with employees at the municipality. Our study show that co-creation is related to intangible aspects, pragmatic alignment in resource integration, and conflicts between interests.

Digital technology facilitates remote access to archaeological collections and offers an accessible platform for knowledge sharing and innovative storytelling. Here, the authors present a newly developed online museum resource co-curated by archaeologists and the descendant community in Quinhagak, Alaska.

This article explores the shift in mental health recovery from mere symptom management to a holistic approach via the CHIME framework. It delves into the author’s experience, beginning with the loss of his father, a war veteran with mental health struggles, at 16, thrusting him into the role of primary caregiver for his mother, who also battled mental health issues and eventually took her own life. These events spotlight the shortcomings of traditional mental health care and the urgent need for empathetic, multifaceted services. Advocating for co-creation in mental health services, the article outlines a transition towards a system that integrates recovery principles through stages from co-ideation to co-evaluation, emphasising holistic, person-centred care. It calls for a reimagined mental healthcare system that respects individual journeys and is rooted in co-creation, signalling a critical move towards systemic change.

Microplastics are ubiquitous in our environment but their presence in air is less well understood. Homes are likely a key source of airborne microplastics and microfibres to the environment owing to the frequent use and storage of plastics and textiles within them. Studying their presence, concentration and distribution in these environments is difficult without the participation of citizens due to accessibility challenges. Few studies have examined the intricacies of the prevalence of indoor microplastics and microfibres or the link between indoor exposure and behavioural and regulatory approaches that could reduce their concentrations. The application of a quintuple innovation helix framework, within which a co-creative citizen science research methodology is applied, provides an opportunity for citizens to shape the scientific method, ensuring that methods are accessible and appropriate for widespread use and designed by the citizen, for the citizen. Exploring behaviours and motivations in plastic and textile use by citizens with industry may reduce the generation of these particles. Future studies should consider the importance of citizen inclusion when designing research strategies for measuring and reducing microplastic concentrations in homes, enabling a nuanced understanding of their generation and distribution and facilitating the development of appropriate behavioural, industrial and regulatory messaging and mitigative measures.