Making Connections - Part 2

Activity 2B of the Making Connections assignment, for Design Studies, requires us to have some good old chitter chatter. Our group got together and spoke about the ideas we came up with in the brainstorming session. I found this very useful as looking back at our notes I felt that we never really spoke about design in that much detail. During the time we set aside for discussion we looked back at our work and started making connections between the statements we made and design.

Activity 2C was allocated four hours and during this time all we had to do was think - as this "is a vital part of the design process." During this time I reflected on the ideas raised in the previous task, and chose a few to pursue in more depth. "Design is a subject that intersects with other disciplines." Taking this on board I decided to relate health to design.

The chapter that I chose to brainstorm was the Law of a Few. This section of the book focuses on word of mouth epidemics, and how it only takes a few people to start a trend. In todays world the easiest way to get a message out their is through advertising, whether this be billboard posters or commercials on television. So how is it then that we often don't take that much notice of government health campaigns? How can design help promote health awareness?

I decided to complete another brainstorm to help explore this idea further. I looked at four main areas: health awareness, advertising, online networking and celebrity culture. I think one of the biggest problems that the government faces when raising a health issue is getting people to take notice. It is only once people do this that they can start taking action. So how can advertising help?

Advertising can be very successful in promoting a topic but only if it grabs the public's attention. When it works not only can it help effectively communicate a message but it gets the information out into society. Producing something that gets the public excited can be difficult. Many of the most successful tv adverts at the moment use humor, for example: compare the market and cadburys chocolate. The commercials themselves don't contain much information about the product they are promoting but because the clips are funny it gets people talking and the brand name sticks in your head.

Online websites are big business these days due to the increased use of the internet. People are now using social networking sites such as bebo and facebook to communicate with one and other. Having online adverts that appear when entering sites such as this would be a perfect way to reach thousands of people. Not only would they be informed they would most likely go on to tell their friends.

Finally I decided to look into celebrity culture, and how our obsession with famous people can be used to promote health. Many big brands use well known faces to promote their products, and they usually gain an increase in sales and a good profit for doing so! I think that getting popular stars involved in health campaigns would have a positive impact. The public would probably take more notice and therefore there would be an increased awareness.

I have to admit that I struggled during the brain storming session to see how areas such as politics, environment and social science related to design. However after the discussion stage of this task and taking time to think about the subjects that were spoken about I can see that design has something to do with every discipline imaginable.