Design in Crisis with Robert Fabricant

What can UX designers learn from the world's greatest experiment in behavior change?

Over the last ten years, UX designers have increasingly embraced the notion that we are in the “behavior change business”. This shift in emphasis, while not universal, is a reflection of a few historic forces, the first being the shift in design away from a focus on the artifacts that we produce towards the broader shifts and changes that those artifacts inspire in the world. The second being the infusion of digital intelligence into so many physical experience and hence the increased ability to shape design systems to be responsive to behavior, even on an individual level. 
These efforts have been spectacularly successful in some areas, such as the invention of the facebook like button. But the effects have also been quite problematic. Despite these outcomes (or perhaps, because of them) we continue to believe in the potential for design to play a more positive role in addressing some of the most pressing and fundamental challenges facing society – like climate change or obesity. 
Over the last two months we have seen a global shift in behavior that would have seemed previously seemed unthinkable. So, what can UX designers learn from the greatest experiment in behavior change in our lifetimes? In this talk, Robert Fabricant will provide a historical perspective as well as highlighting practical examples from the pandemic response.