RTX.
EMOTION & COMMUNICATION
Project Brief
Communication has always been an essential part of our life. When undesirable situations happen, how we communicate significantly impacts how others think and feel about the situation. I launched this social experiment to help people better express their emotions.
Some psychologists use the Rorschach test to examine a person's personality characteristics and emotional functioning, especially in cases where patients are reluctant to describe their thinking processes openly. Inspired by this test, I want to find out if a visually interactive tool, such as a mood board, can help people better communicate their emotions.
PREPARATION
Experiment Information
HYPOTHESIS
A visually interactive tool, such as a mood board, can help people better communicate their emotions
PARTICIPANT
Eric is a male studio manager
TIME
7pm - 9pm on Oct. 26th 2022
PROCEDURE
See diagram below
PROCEDURE
*Portrait of the participant is taken on Sep.12th 2022
IMAGES
Happy | Angry | Scared
Sad | Participant Mix | Partner Mix
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OUTCOME
Result + Interview
Emotion & Abstraction
When I asked Eric to draw the four moods, I found that he had a specific image for "Happy", a car, and "Fear", a snake. However, he uses abstract shapes for "Angry" and "Sad". Eric uses a lot of red in both "Angry" and "Fear", while "Happy" is black and white.
Different people have different associations with a particular emotion. When I asked Eric why he didn't use any color on the car, he said he could use colors, but he thought colors weren't necessary because happiness is very simple, and it's the subject that makes him happy no matter what color it is.
Emotion & Perspective
Crystal listened to the recording of Eric telling the story and then created the mood board using the elements created by Eric. I didn't tell crystal which element represents which mood, but Crystal is 90% accurate, except for the "Sad" one, which Crystal thought was "Unhappy" or "Upset".
When Crystal created the mood board, she thought the primary emotion should be "Sad" or "Unhappy/Upset". However, Eric doesn't feel very "Sad" but mostly "Angry". This surprised Crystal because she said she would feel very sad if she were in that situation.
