AHFE Open AccessThe Human Side of Service Engineering
Editors: Christine Leitner, Clara Bassano, Debra Satterfield
Topics: Human Side of Service Engineering
ISBN: 978-1-964867-97-7
DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1007240
Table of Contents
Translational Service Research And Design Methodology: What it is, What it is not, What it might be
Translational Service Research and Design Methodology (TSRDM, (Warg et al., 2025)) addresses persistent translational gaps between rapidly growing scientific discoveries and their delayed, partial, or failed implementation in practice (Sung et al., 2003, Woolf, 2008). Although knowledge creation accelerates, implementation often lags behind, as observed across domains such as medicine, digital transformation, and sustainability (Jones, 2009, Vial, 2019). Grounded in the centrality of service (Spohrer et al., 2022), TSRDM advances a "unifying service language" that provides a higher-order, domain agnostic grammar for aligning research, design, engineering, and implementation. It reconceives the path from scientific discovery to real-world use as a service-based and ecosystemic journey rather than a linear handover between disciplines, and structures this journey as an eight-step process built around three pillars. TSRDM provides a robust translational framework for configuring steps, decisions, roles, services, flows, and relationships, thereby making translational gaps, frictions, linkages, and transitions visible as explicit design dimensions. This, in turn, aims to accelerate the overcoming of translational gaps and the implementation of service innovations that support sustainable human well-becoming.
Markus Warg, James Clinton Spohrer, Tilo Böhmann, Christine Leitner, Luca Carrubbo, Peter Weiss, Jens Neuhüttler, Volker Gruhn, Marc Alexander Burmeister
Open Access
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Conference Proceedings
Service Ecosystem Engineering to Overcome Translational Gaps in Digital Transformation
Digital transformation initiatives continue to fail at rates between 70% and 95%, as technology‑driven efforts further densify already complex application landscapes instead of translating technological potential into realized value (Koczerga, 2024, Bughin et al., 2019). To systematically address these translational gaps (Sung et al., 2003, Woolf, 2008), this paper introduces Service Ecosystem Engineering (SESE) as a paradigm shift from technology‑dominated to structure‑dominated transformation strategies grounded in the centrality of service (Spohrer et al., 2022) and the Translational Service Research and Design Methodology (Warg et al., 2025). SESE adopts a unifying service language in which service provides the overarching grammar and services act as the primary structuring paradigm. Drawing on Service Dominant Architecture (SDA) as a reference structure, SESE organizes value-creation systems as actors, roles, processes, and services across five systems for interaction, data, participation, institutions, and operant resources. In doing so, SDA serves both as medium for service design and outcome of software engineering (Gruhn and Striemer, 2018). This SESE approach decouples value-creation systems from specific technologies, and enables pace‑controlled modernization, interoperability, and ecosystem‑wide value cocreation, helping organizations overcome translational gaps and evolve as learning organizations.
Volker Gruhn, Markus Warg
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Human Judgment in Democratic Service Systems: A Knowledge–Values–Thinking Capability Framework
Service systems in democratic societies fundamentally depend on human judgment, yet the mechanisms through which such judgments are formed remain insufficiently understood. In pluralistic societies, actors often hold different interpretations of benefit, fairness, and social good. Under such conditions, service provision and acceptance cannot be fully determined by predefined procedures or centralized coordination; instead, service interactions rely on judgments formed by both providers and receivers. This paper proposes a conceptual framework that places human judgment at the center of service co-creation. The framework assumes that judgment emerges from the interaction of three fundamental human resources: knowledge, values, and thinking capability. The paper also outlines a research program consisting of (1) analytical research based on oral-history interviews with key participants who have initiated service innovations and (2) constructive modeling of judgment formation at individual and organizational levels. By clarifying how knowledge, values, and thinking capability interact to shape human judgment, this study aims to contribute to a democratic foundation for service innovation and to the design of service systems that rely on responsible human judgment.
Kazuyoshi Shimada
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Bridging Translational Gaps in Psychological Care - A Care Platform Approach
Psychological care systems face increasing demand while struggling to scale access, quality, and impact. Despite strong clinical evidence for the effectiveness of psychotherapy, many organizations encounter structural frictions that prevent available expertise, human resources, and digital solutions from translating into scalable patient value. This paper examines these challenges through the case of Neue Realitäten AG (NRAG), a Swiss provider of psychological diagnostics, psychotherapy, expert opinions for courts or child protection authorities, and clinical supervision.Adopting a design-oriented and translational research approach, the study applies the Translational Service Research and Design Methodology (TSRDM) to identify four interrelated translational gaps in psychological care: talent-to-value, knowledge-to-role, human-to-scalability, and solutions-to-value. These gaps are understood as organizational and architectural deficiencies rather than clinical shortcomings.To address these frictions, the paper develops a platform-based psychological care architecture grounded in Service Dominant Architecture (SDA). Psychological care is modeled as an end-to-end service system organized around five organizational capabilities: interaction, participation, operant resources, data, and institutions. A structured care pathway integrates clinical care, supervision, billing, office management, and outcome measurement as constitutive services.The findings illustrate how combining SDA with extreme ownership and architectural simplicity enables clearer accountability, scalable supervision capacity, and improved observation of value-in-use in real care situations. The paper offers a transferable design approach for scalable, accountable, and patient-centered psychological care.
Erik Foelting, Jennifer Steinbach
Open Access
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Conference Proceedings
Closing the AI-Loop: A Review of Human-Guided Machine Learning Approaches
The integration of human feedback into AI models (Human-in-the-Loop, HITL) represents a central research field that is gaining increasing importance. While classical AI approaches primarily rely on historical data, HITL enables the incorporation of expert knowledge and user feedback into the training and decision-making process. This paper systematically examines the methods of Active Learning, Interactive Machine Learning, Reinforcement Learning, and Contextual Bandits. The aim is to highlight their respective strengths and weaknesses, to identify practical fields of application, and to discuss key challenges. Finally, an outlook on future developments in the field of human-centered AI systems is provided.
Johannes Stübinger, Niko Grosch
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Evolving the OVB Service Platform Approach to Overcome the AI Experimentation Trap
OVB, a leading organization in the financial services sector, is proactively leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to drive innovation and deliver measurable benefits in both customer experience and operational efficiency. During this AI-driven transformation, the company encountered the “AI Experimentation Trap” (Furr and Shipolov, 2025, Huang et al., 2025), the difficulty of converting promising AI prototypes into scalable, compliant, and value-generating solutions. In an era of increasing technological densification, many organizations face similar challenges, compounded by phenomena such as “Shadow AI” and the “Governance Drift Zone” (Silic et al., 2025). To address these challenges, and particularly to embed AI effectively into OVB’s core processes while maintaining customer relevance, the organization adopts a Service-Dominant (S-D) mindset, treating services as the central structuring paradigm. Complementing this approach, OVB employs Service Dominant Architecture (SDA), (Spohrer et al., 2022) as enterprise architecture and organizing logic for both its process design and its technical implementation as core platform. This architectural approach enables the seamless integration of AI-enabled services into the broader business ecosystem. The research picked the Translational Service Research and Design Methodology (TSRDM) (Warg et al., 2025) to systematically generate, translate, and apply knowledge that bridges the persistent gap between scientific advances in AI and their practical, value-creating implementation. In this way the work also contributes to the development of the unifying service language of TSRDM.
Heinrich Fritzlar, Andrea Will
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Beyond Availability: Closing Adoption Gaps in Digital Health Prevention — A TSRDM Approach
Adoption failures in digital health prevention indicate that availability and technological maturity are insufficient conditions for preventive value creation (Borghouts et al., 2021; Hawkes et al., 2023; Saleem et al., 2021). Prior research suggests that these failures are not primarily driven by user motivation deficits, but by structural problems in translating preventive intent into service design and experienced value (Borges Do Nascimento et al., 2023; Iyanna et al., 2022). This paper applies the Translational Service Research and Design Methodology (TSRDM) (Warg et al., 2025) to examine adoption failures in digital health prevention as service translation problems rather than acceptance or intervention deficits. Drawing on Service-Dominant Logic, Service Science, and Service-Dominated Architecture (SDA) (Vargo and Lusch, 2004; Warg et al., 2016), the study translates observed adoption frictions into service-centered design logic, translational services, and modular service architectures for health insurance ecosystems. The findings demonstrate that preventive value becomes effective only when it is translated into everyday service interactions, that sustained engagement requires continuity-oriented service structures, and that adoption ultimately depends on governance decisions at the level of service architecture rather than on isolated programs or features. The paper contributes transferable service and architectural design knowledge by showing how preventive intent must be translated into service-centered architectures to enable perceivable value, sustained engagement, and adoption in digital health prevention.
Susanna Krämer
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Navigating Digital Transformation: The Strategic Alliance as a Digital Catalyst for Corporate Digital Entrepreneurship in China’s EV Transition
The global automotive industry is undergoing a profound and rapid digital transformation, driven by electrification (EVs), autonomous driving, and connected services. This represents a foundational shift away from traditional manufacturing and toward a model focused on Intelligent, Broadband, and Integrated Services (IBIS), where digital competence defines market leadership. This shift demands that large traditional manufacturers engage in sustained Corporate Digital Entrepreneurship (CDE). Firms must leverage dynamic capabilities to secure competitive advantage, especially within the specific and fast-moving context of the Chinese market. In this highly- evolving environment, competitiveness is determined not just by producing electric vehicles, but by the continuous entrepreneurial creation of new digital value streams within the corporation. Yet legacy automakers confront a major obstacle of entrenched organizational inertia combined with the urgent need to develop new digital competencies. This tension mirrors the classic trade-off between exploitation and exploration.Existing research tends to address this problem via two distinct pathways. The first relies on internal structural ambidexterity: established firms build independent exploratory capabilities (EC) to drive internal digital transformation. The second emphasizes external resource acquisition through Strategic Alliances (SAs), enabling access to required digital assets. However, both approaches present limitations: the internal one is slow and resource-intensive, while the purely external path often leads to temporary resource exchange without permanent organizational learning. In short, neither pathway fully captures how SAs can go beyond resource provision, functioning instead as catalysts that embed long-term CDE within a legacy firm.This ongoing study investigates how large traditional automakers can leverage strategically framed alliances as a Digital Catalyst to foster and internalize exploratory capabilities (EC), enabling sustainable CDE. We propose the SA-to-EC Catalyst Model, arguing that alliances act as intermediaries bridging resource gaps and triggering systematic internal transformation by formalizing knowledge transfer and imposing new digital performance metrics on the parent company, thereby preserving competitive relevance in a fast-evolving digital market.The research employs a holistic qualitative single-case design, examining a leading Chinese automaker transitioning from traditional internal-combustion-engine (ICE) production to a dedicated EV platform. The case selection is justified by the firm’s historically strong market position, which makes its organizational inertia a pronounced challenge, and its recent formation of a landmark joint venture with a pure-play tech company. The longitudinal observation spans five years (2018–2023), capturing the formative period of digital capability development. Data are triangulated via 30 semi-structured interviews with executives and managers in R&D, strategy, and operations; extensive archival analysis of internal documents, annual reports, and digital platform launch materials; and direct observation of the firm’s digital product development journey. Analysis proceeds via process tracing, mapping how the SA governance structure triggers cultural and structural change and leads to sustained CDE.Early findings indicate that the alliance; structured as a joint venture; functions as a “digital sandbox,” externalizing risk while offering managerial and technical templates that accelerate internal learning. This research contributes to digital-strategy scholarship by providing a process-oriented lens on how external partnerships evolve beyond resource exchanges to become deep capability catalysts. Specifically, it advances CDE literature by shifting the focus from internal organizational structures to external strategic mechanisms as the engine of entrepreneurial renewal. Practically, it offers a validated strategic framework for legacy firms in high-velocity sectors, such as automotive, to overcome digital inertia via alliances and achieve genuine CDE. It also aligns with evidence linking digital transformation to improved firm-level performance under supportive corporate cultures.
Sanaz Bakhshi Nia, Ruilin Zhu, Wei Li
Open Access
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Conference Proceedings
Shaping Börsen-Zeitung: Evolving from Print Media to a Leading Community Platform for Financial Market Decision-Makers
Börsen-Zeitung (BZ), a leading German financial newspaper, is transforming from a transaction-centered print medium into a relationship-centered digital community platform for financial market decision-makers. On its transformation journey BZ encounters the “media-transformation gap”, understood as the lag between the transformative potential of digital technologies and the value actually realized in media organizations. To develop knowledge and concepts for bridging this gap, the research applies the Translational Service Research and Design Methodology (TSRDM) and adopts a service lens grounded in Service-Dominant Logic, Service Science, and Service Dominant Architecture (Warg et al., 2025, Woolf, 2008, Spohrer et al., 2022). The findings indicate that by reinterpreting BZ as a service and relationship platform and by structuring offerings as modular services, the organization can reconfigure roles, workflows, and capabilities in a way that editorial content, data, and interaction services reinforce each other in a “platform flywheel” of engagement and learning. The work demonstrates how editorial content transforms from a tangible newspaper as output to an adaptive digital value proposition and input into modular offerings like newsletters, podcasts, and community verticals. While customers move from passive readers to active co‑creators interacting on BZ value propositions and resources and thus build momentum for BZ transformation to a data driven, learning organization continuously enhancing its capacities and capabilities to create (McGowan and Shipley, 2020, Senge, 2006).
Joachim Lauterbach
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Applying TSRDM framework to Charité´s Fast Follower IT Strategy - Bridging Translational Gaps of Digital Transformation
This paper applies the Translational Service Research and Design Methodology (TSRDM) to Charité - University Medicine’s fast‑follower IT strategy, which aims to transform the organization into a digital, connected, adaptive, and learning university hospital. Charité positions digitalization as an enabler for improving care quality, patient experience, and staff relief - not as an end in itself - yet faces pronounced translational gaps between technological potential and realized value in practice. The study conceptualizes two core gaps in Charité’s digital transformation: the “technology‑to‑solution” gap and the “solution‑to‑value” gap.Using TSRDM’s eight‑step process, the research develops a service‑based knowledge base grounded in Service‑Dominant Logic, Service Science, and Service‑Dominant Architecture. It introduces a unifying service language and SDA‑based patterns that map services onto generic systems of interaction, participation, operant resources, data, and institutions, translating abstract service theory into reusable translational services, design principles, and platform architectures.Findings demonstrate how TSRDM systematically derives service concepts and translational services that address interoperability challenges for the technology‑to‑solution gap and enhance value‑in‑use, stakeholder engagement, and closed‑loop learning for the solution‑to‑value gap. By operationalizing Charité’s fast‑follower orientation, TSRDM enables the hospital to move from isolated “digital islands” to a scalable portfolio of interoperable, platform‑based digital services that can be rapidly adopted and adapted across contexts. The study concludes that TSRDM not only analyzes but actively strengthens Charité’s fast‑follower strategy by bridging translational gaps and advancing human‑centered digital innovation and well‑being.
Christian Powalla, Anne Marie Schneider
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Bridging Translational Gaps in Learning Healthcare Systems
Persistent translational gaps continue to limit the impact of scientific discoveries, digital innovations, and evidence-based practices in healthcare, despite major advances in artificial intelligence, data interoperability, and digital health infrastructure. Learning Health Systems (LHS) offer a compelling vision for continuous, data driven improvement, yet most remain aspirational because they lack the sociotechnical mechanisms needed to embed learning into routine practice. Drawing on service science, design science, sociotechnical systems theory, and implementation science, this paper proposes an integrated conceptual framework that combines Translational Service Design (TSD) with LHS principles to address these longstanding barriers. The resulting synthesis clarifies how innovations can move from discovery to implementation to sustained learning, overcoming the “valleys of death” that typically impede adoption. By positioning TSD as the methodological and architectural foundation of LHS, this work offers a coherent pathway for transforming continuous learning from an aspirational ideal into an operational reality, laying the foundation for future empirical validation and technical specification.
Nabil Badr, Claude Lawrence II, Luca Carrubbo
Open Access
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Conference Proceedings
The mimetic Power for the Diffusion of Innovation
Scientific research creates knowledge, theories, or models that might lead to innovation of products, processes, or institutions (e.g., e-markets) offering practical value propositions to improve human well-being. This paper aims to reflect the translational process of scientific knowledge gaining, practical innovations, and their diffusion in the market. Mimetic reciprocity contributes to the evolution of complex social, cultural, and representational capabilities. The research question here is how mimesis, a strategy of empowerment through imitation, enables the diffusion of innovation. This paper approaches the effect of imitation on the diffusion of innovations through the memetic theory and the frame of SDL. The power of mimesis is relevant to understand the dynamics in a service ecosystem in three respects: (1) Imitation for innovation, as foundation for the acquisition of actor´s capabilities (e. g. language, knowledge, or culture). (2) Imitation for actor´s identity formation and institutionalization, as actor´s shape themselves, by orienting towards others and the acquisition of the principles that underlie the imitated actions. (3) Imitation for diffusion and market shaping, understanding imitation as a driver for the diffusion of innovation – imitation becomes a market shaping capability to initiate a fashion or a trend. The theoretical implication is to introduce mimesis as a source of power into service ecosystems. Furthermore, the understanding of the innovation diffusion process and its phases is improved.
Johannes Hogg
Open Access
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Conference Proceedings
Retreat Redesign: A Case Study Using the IIPL Approach
Academic faculty retreats are routinely geared towards professional development, team building, and strategic planning. They encourage focused discussions and often employ collaborative exercises and activities. However, the intricacies of how these events are built and facilitated can be the difference between meaningful outcomes and results that may be considered impersonal or merely procedural. This case study examines the strategic implementation and facilitation of a prototype faculty retreat event developed to support meaningful collaborative ideation utilizing the IIPL Approach. The IIPL Approach fuses Personal Leadership Philosophy practices with Design Thinking and Creative Problem Solving (CPS) methods to support introspective, value-based outcomes in creative activities. It is guided by four criteria for success (introspective, inclusive, personal, local) along with a series of mindsets. This creative methodology was selected to provide the structure for a recent design faculty and staff retreat event held on the campus of California State University, Long Beach. The event topics addressed the changing landscape of building academic and professional communities and subsequently expanded into related areas including design technologies, artificial intelligence, and design education. In following the IIPL Approach, these topics were structurally driven by Personal Leadership Philosophy. The event format, exercises, facilitation strategies, observed outcomes, and reflections on participant engagement are discussed, along with comparisons to a prior application of the IIPL Approach.
Wesley Woelfel
Open Access
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Conference Proceedings
Linking context to outcomes: Building transformational design patterns using Service Dominant Architecture (SDA)
This paper contributes to the session Translational Service Research and Design Methodology (TSRDM). Translational gaps between scientific discoveries and applied service innovations pose significant social and economic challenges. In response to the social and economic challenges posed by "translational gaps", TSRDM (Warg et al., 2025) is adopted as a systematic approach to eliminating the obstacles associated with these gaps. Presented research is ongoing and expands previous research on Service Dominant Architecture (SDA) through conceptualizing and theorizing transformational mechanisms and incorporating them as justificatory knowledge for design theorizing into SDA framework and methodology.
Peter Weiss
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Fight infodemic and fake news by AI-human driven approach
Disinformation, commonly referred to fake news, represents a structural threat to the integrity of information ecosystems. The rapid diffusion of misleading and false content has contributed to an “infodemic” characterized by trust erosion, informational overload, and increasing news avoidance. While technological solutions have been proposed to counter these dynamics, their effectiveness remains limited without the integration of human interpretive capabilities. This study investigates the approach and management of fake news through the ecosystems lens, framing digital information environments as value-oriented ecosystems in which interactions among actors, technologies, and institutions shape informational outcomes.Adopting an interpretive and inductive approach, the paper uses a real co-financed R&D project titled “Trinity” as an empirical illustration of a human-machine configuration designed to manage disinformation. The analysis connects ecosystem value dynamics, with observable information phenomena. In this perspective, fake news and news avoidance are interpreted as interconnected manifestations of value co-destruction that undermine trust and reduce the system’s corrective capacity, by reducing the translational gap between theoretical reflections on ecosystem value dynamics and the operational challenges of disinformation management in AI-mediated information environments.The findings suggest that hybrid human-machine interaction models can act as rebalancing mechanisms, combining the scalability of AI-based detection with the contextual judgment and ethical oversight of human actors. Such configurations can drive value co-creation processes by realigning trust, verification, and participation within the ecosystem.
Francesco Polese, Luca Carrubbo, Giuliana Sorvillo, Mario Galderisi
Open Access
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Applying Brunswik’s Lens Model to Investigate Decision-Making in Food Bank Operations
Despite the power of data analytics, the human decision making cannot be overlooked in the food bank operations. To better integrate humans with intelligent systems, judgement policies of food bank operations managers need to be investigated. This study explored the impact and relative importance of cues on agency status decision making using Brunswik’s Lens model. Cues were identified by communicating with senior members of a local food bank Partner Services. Judgment information was drawn from a table combining data from agency monthly reports and account aging summary, while criterion responses were found using a rule-based selection according to food bank documentation. The findings of this study could shed light on integrating humans with intelligent systems.
Steven Jiang, Ritson Delpish
Open Access
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Conference Proceedings
AI Upskilling promoting Peer-to-Peer Learning using Self-Selected Real-Work Use Cases
Generative AI is transforming knowledge-intensive work and increasing the need for employees to develop skills for the responsible and effective use of generative AI. Companies therefore face challenges in supporting AI upskilling, including heterogeneous prior skill levels, difficulties in identifying use cases for AI‑supported work, and the need for continuous, context‑specific learning. This paper presents an AI upskilling approach based on work and learning projects (ALP), enabling employees to engage with generative AI by means of self‑selected real‑work use cases. The approach is based on work-integrated learning and combines structured methodological guidance with authentic work tasks to promote situated and transferable upskilling. The AI upskilling was implemented with employees at the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering IAO, who selected real tasks from their daily work and processed them using a standardized sequence of learning steps. A dedicated website supported the process by providing tutorials, use case inspirations, and a prompt library for documenting and sharing prompts. Peer‑to‑peer learning sessions enabled employees to exchange experiences, validate emerging learnings, and collaboratively reflect on challenges encountered during AI‑supported work. The results indicate that combining embedded practice, self‑selected task processing, methodological scaffolding, and peer collaboration fosters the development of essential AI‑related skills, including prompting, critical curation of AI outputs, and contextualization. The AI upskilling approach supports scalable and sustainable skill development and demonstrates how work‑integrated learning formats can prepare employees to use generative AI responsibly and productively in dynamic, digitalized work environments.
Leonie Kuhn, Carsten Schmidt, Wolfgang Beinhauer, Bernd Dworschak, Alexander Karapidis, Kathrin Schnalzer, Katharina Hölzle
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A Phenomenological Experiment of Human-AI Communication to Study Online Discourse
The paper describes the author’s personal phenomenological experience of interacting with a chat-based AI system to examine its ability to analyse online discussion. Jurgen Habermas’ validity claim concept was applied as the underlying theoretical framework to examine the text of posted messages by revealing the relationship between their language and semantic logic through AI lens. The key theoretical finding is that AI understood well the complex task of coding the messages’ intended meaning by discerning the link between validity claims and respective illocutionary speech acts. The key practical finding is two-fold: (a) AI worded correctly both the claims and speech acts in line with the guiding example presented by the author, and (b) AI significantly improved the accuracy of such wording following another round of specifying prompts. Overall, it can be concluded that AI’s performance in this experiment was high but depended on the quality of the author’s input.
Yuri Misnikov
Open Access
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Development of Future Skills through Innovative Learning Concepts: Evidence from the Information Systems 2.0 Program at Coburg University
Digital transformation and AI reshape professional environments, intensifying demands for transversal competencies beyond disciplinary knowledge (Goulart et al., 2022; Saleem et al., 2024). Higher education institutions are increasingly expected to foster Future Skills that enable graduates to act autonomously, responsibly and collaboratively in uncertain contexts (Allianz für Future Skills, 2024; Ehlers, 2020, 2022; Rampelt et al., 2025). Yet empirical evidence on whether innovative programs support the development of such competencies from the learners’ perspective remains limited.This paper presents results from a quantitative student survey in the bachelor’s program Information Systems 2.0 – Digital Innovation and Transformation (IS2) at Coburg University of Applied Sciences (Hochschule Coburg, 2025d). The study uses Ehlers’ (2020) NextSkills framework, conceptualizing 17 Future Skill profiles grouped into subject-, object- and organization-related competencies. The enrolled IS2 students (N = 26) were invited to an online questionnaire; the majority participated (n = 20), assessing perceived development of the 17 profiles and contributions of selected program characteristics. Descriptive analyses indicate predominantly positive perceptions of competence development, with particularly strong ratings for object- and organization-related skills such as Design Thinking, Innovation, Cooperation and Future & Design Competence. Students attribute these developments primarily to authentic project-based learning with real organizations, an interactive learning culture characterized by a student-lecturer relationship on equal footing and competence-oriented assessment formats (Grosch, 2024; Zagel et al., 2024). From the students’ perspective, findings suggest immersive, practice-based, student-centered learning formats are linked to self-reported development of selected future skills. Given limitations of sample size and design, results should be regarded as exploratory and warrant validation through longitudinal and objective measures.
Daniel Heim, Christian Grosch, Sophia Frank
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From Concept to Closet: Expectations and Realities in Circular Denim Design
Product design plays a critical role in advancing a more circular and thereby sustainable fashion industry. While various circular design approaches exist, each product group offers particular challenges. Given this complexity, the present article focuses on denim jeans, which allows for specific but scalable insights, due to denim’s global ubiquity. The objective of this research is an exploratory analysis of industry professionals’ expectations and realities in circular denim design contexts. The analysis is grounded in the principle-based philosophical framework for Fashion Design Praxis by Harvey & Ankiewicz (2023), examining volition (mind-set), design knowledge (epistemology), design process (methodology), and objects (ontology) in circular denim design. Data were collected through semi-structured qualitative interviews with denim professionals (n=9) including designers, and technical specialists at different stages of adopting circular practices. Interpreting findings through the underlying framework reveals differences between conventional and circularity-optimized denim design from early design stages to final product aesthetics. While the analysis identified trade-offs regarding components like fabrics, washes or trims, it also highlights how the given constraints can stimulate creativity and enable innovative design solutions. This research provides insights to proactively manage change processes for circular design adoption and outlines concrete directions for future empirical research that support the broader transition toward a more circular fashion industry.
Lotta Straube
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Bridging the Gap Between Stratification and Personalization in Precision Medicine: "Invisible Labor" and Value Transformation in Japanese Cancer Genomic Medicine
This study aims to clarify how frontline healthcare professionals transform the imbalance between clinical outcomes and patient needs—arising from the transitional implementation phase of cancer genomic medicine, a core domain of Precision Medicine (PM)—into meaningful value. Since its introduction in the United States in 2015, PM has been promoted across advanced nations as a "forward-looking promise" to create the next generation of standard care (Ackerman 2022: 197). Meanwhile, Japan entered a unique implementation phase in 2019, integrating cancer genomic medicine into its universal healthcare system. Currently, a large-scale national survey (Sunami et al. 2022) reveals a structural imbalance: the success rate of identifying therapeutic drugs (the primary objective) remains at 7.7%, whereas the detection rate of genetic risks (secondary findings, or SF), a by-product, is higher at 10.3%. Based on qualitative research at two facilities in Japan, this study utilizes Bogicevic et al.'s (2021) mode classification and Ackerman's (2022) concept of "invisible labor" for analysis. The findings indicate that the "labor of connection" performed by healthcare professionals serves to humanize and personalize the otherwise undesirable outcomes of finding no targeted treatments or disclosing SFs affecting patients' families. From a service engineering perspective, this study visualizes the value transformation process and proposes a framework for human-centered medical service design.
Kazuo Sakai, Yasunobu Ito
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Shared Value Creation Through Hosting in Long-Term Work-Experience Programs: Case studies from Japanese SMEs
Work-Integrated Learning (WIL) is widely recognized as an effective approach that integrates academic learning with professional practice; however, its institutionalization in Japan remains limited. In Japan, the policy-driven introduction of “internship” as a component of career education has constrained firms from implementing such programs primarily for recruitment purposes. As a result, corporate acceptance of work-experience opportunities has tended to be framed as an expression of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). This framing has made it difficult to implement long-term work experiences, a tendency that is particularly pronounced among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Although government’s interest in long-term work-experience programs in Japan has been increasing, many SMEs remain passive about adoption due to the substantial resource burden and the absence of clearly articulated benefits. This study examines these practices through qualitative case studies of Japanese SMEs that have pioneered the introduction of long-term work-experience programs, implemented in collaboration with universities as long-term project-based learning (PBL) and long-term internship programs. The analysis reveals that these firms have redesigned the acceptance of work-experience programs not merely as CSR activities, but as initiatives grounded in Creating Shared Value (CSV), linking educational value with business objectives such as recruitment, project development, knowledge acquisition, and employee learning through mentoring. These findings suggest that CSV-oriented program design may provide a viable pathway for the sustainable diffusion of long-term WIL in Japan.
Masaki Hirakawa, Yasunobu Ito
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Creative Horizontal Deployment in the Japanese Entertainment Business: Architectural Redesign and Collaborative Creativity Through the Life Story of a Content Producer
This paper examines how 'Horizontal Deployment' in the digital entertainment industry can function as a form of creative innovation, going beyond the simple reuse of assets. Horizontal deployment can be understood as a process of spatial re-architecting and re-signification across contexts. In practice, transforming existing media structures and business power dynamics requires 'culturalisation' (contextual adaptation). Through a qualitative life-story analysis of a content producer, the study shows that the key to successful horizontal deployment lies in redesigning architecture—specifically, 'unbundling' corporate knowledge and 'rebundling' it in new spatial contexts. We also argue that this transformation is not the product of individual genius, but rather a form of 'strategic creativity' grounded in 'Collaborative Creativity' through relationships with a range of actors.
Yasunobu Ito, Makoto Tanaka
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What Aspects of Tacit Knowledge Are Structurally Excluded from Generative AI? : A Conceptual Framework of Mediation, Structure, and Representation
Recent advances in generative AI, particularly large language models and multimodal foundation models, have renewed interest in whether tacit knowledge can be learned or reproduced by machines. While prior studies emphasize the growing ability of generative AI to approximate patterns of human reasoning, judgment, and action, comparatively little attention has been paid to what aspects of tacit knowledge are excluded by design. This paper addresses this gap by asking a conceptual question: which aspects of tacit knowledge are structurally excluded from contemporary generative AI research? Rather than treating tacit knowledge as a single implicit capability, this study reorganizes prior research into three analytical perspectives: mediation, structure, and representation. From this viewpoint, tacit knowledge is sustained by processes that translate practice into communicable forms, by social and cultural structures that stabilize judgment and action, and by representational practices that constitute tacit knowledge as an object of analysis. These perspectives are then used to examine recent developments in generative AI. The analysis shows that current generative AI systems primarily engage with the externalized outcomes of tacit knowledge, such as observable reasoning patterns or action trajectories, while leaving its formative conditions unaddressed. Processes of mediation, social and institutional structures, and reflexive representational practices remain outside model design. These limitations are not merely technical but reflect structural design choices embedded in contemporary AI research. By clarifying these boundaries, this paper provides a conceptual framework for reconsidering the division of roles between human practice and generative AI in future socio-technical systems.
Takashi Onoda, Yasunobu Ito
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Conference Proceedings
Tacit Knowledge Management with Generative AI: Proposal of the GenAI SECI Model
The emergence of generative AI is bringing about a significant transformation in knowledge management. Generative AI has the potential to address the limitations of conventional knowledge management systems, and it is increasingly being deployed in real-world settings with promising results. Related research is also expanding rapidly. However, much of this work focuses on research and practice related to the management of explicit knowledge. While fragmentary efforts have been made regarding the management of tacit knowledge using generative AI, the modeling and systematization that handle both tacit and explicit knowledge in an integrated manner remain insufficient. In this paper, we propose the "GenAI SECI" model as an updated version of the knowledge creation process (SECI) model, redesigned to leverage the capabilities of generative AI. A defining feature of the "GenAI SECI" model is the introduction of "Digital Fragmented Knowledge", a new concept that integrates explicit and tacit knowledge within cyberspace. Furthermore, a concrete system configuration for the proposed model is presented, along with a comparison with prior research models that share a similar problem awareness and objectives.
Naoshi Uchihira
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
The Dynamics of Trust in AI Systems: Human–Machine Collaboration Within the MLS Exploitation Process
This study examines how trust in human–machine collaboration evolves within the exploitation process of machine learning systems (MLS), spanning from non-ML environments to fully autonomous operation. Building on prior research on the exploitation process of machine learning systems, the study positions trust as a foundational mechanism enabling sustainable human-machine collaboration. Drawing on the trust framework of Siau and Wang (2018), five trust-related dimensions—usability and reliability, collaboration and communication, sociability and bonding, security and privacy protection, and interpretability—were operationalized as survey items measured on a five-point Likert scale. Differences across exploitation phases were examined using ANOVA, and principal component analysis (PCA) was conducted to identify latent user archetypes underlying trust orientations. The results suggest distinct trust configurations across phases of the MLS exploitation process: Visualization, Human-centered ML Assistance, ML-centered Human Assistance, and Autonomy. Early phases emphasize collaboration and communication, highlighting the role of relational trust in initial adoption. As system autonomy increases, interpretability and privacy-related concerns gain relative importance, while in the autonomy phase, security and privacy protection tend to become more salient trust requirements. Interpretability gradually declines as MLS becomes operationally embedded, consistent with a shift from transparency-based trust to stability-based trust. Furthermore, the analysis identifies three latent user archetypes shaping trust orientations in human–machine collaboration: the General Users, the AI Practitioners, and the AI Translators. These findings clarify process-dependent trust dynamics and user-level differentiation within MLS exploitation, offering practical guidance for designing trustworthy AI systems aligned with system maturity and organizational roles
Satoshi Okuda, Naoshi Uchihira
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
A Stepwise, Ethnography-Informed Observational Learning Framework for Novice Learners: Implications from Undergraduate Medical Education
This study explored how a stepwise, ethnography-informed observational learning framework, drawing on cultural anthropology, supports learning and meaning-making in the early phase of undergraduate medical education. The program combined preparatory lectures, field observation, a staged writing process, in which rapid notes served as scaffolding for learning through polished field notes, and reflection through sharing and comparison. Qualitative analysis focused on students’ polished field notes and reflective writings, revealing a clear shift from fragmented, immediate observational records to structured, contextualized descriptions of clinical settings. Students attended to multiple layers of practice, including interpersonal interactions, actions, spatial organization, and medical tools. Through comparison with peers’ observations, learners recognized the multiplicity of perspectives and reflected on the quality and communicability of their own descriptions. Questionnaire data further indicated increased interest in cultural anthropology and enhanced patient-centered perspectives following the program. These findings demonstrate the utility of this design model for supporting novices' contextual understanding and professional perspective formation in early clinical exposure. The study offers a transferable model for fostering insight into the human side of practice in other person-centered work environments.
Daisuke Aono, Yasunobu Ito
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Place Make the Vote: Designing for Voter Participation and Civic Engagement
Place Make the Vote, a project spearheaded by design studio City Fabrick for the 2016 elections in Long Beach, CA, used placemaking, tactical urbanism, art, music, food, and furnishings to create a fun, festival environment and build a sense of community at underserved polling places by encouraging people to interact with their neighbors and participate in civic life. This innovative project provides a model for successful civic engagement and encouragement of participatory democracy to create stronger, more resilient, and interconnected communities. The Place Make the Vote Toolkit extends the project’s reach beyond Long Beach by creating a scalable, adaptable, and customizable model for increasing civic engagement and voter participation in a variety of communities. It offers several strategies for improving the urban and civic environment, providing new opportunities for community to flourish through the deployment of decentralized, low-cost, low-tech, quick, and scalable urban interventions. These tactics aim to transform civic spaces by utilizing input from community members, local political leaders, and educational and cultural institutions to increase voter turnout, build community, activate public space, and promote civic engagement more broadly.
Tom Tredway
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Algorithmic Affect and Micro-Gestures: Emotional Codes in Fashion Live Shopping Streaming (LSS)
Live Shopping Streaming (LSS) is rapidly reshaping digital fashion retail by combining real-time commerce with entertainment, social interaction, and emotional performance. Existing research often treats engagement, trust, and impulse buying as outcomes of livestreaming, while emotional dynamics are measured as aggregate psychological states rather than as situated, embodied, and culturally patterned practices. This paper addresses this gap by examining how affect is performed, structured, and interpreted in fashion live shopping across Eastern and Western contexts. The study employs a mixed-methods design, integrating digital ethnography, multimodal interaction analysis, surveys, and semi-structured interviews. Fashion livestreams on Douyin, Taobao Live, TikTok Shop, and Instagram Live between 2022 and 2024 were analyzed, alongside audience research with Generation Z fashion students in Italy. Emotional performance is treated as a semiotically organized, interactional achievement shaped by platform affordances, cultural expectations, and algorithmic feedback. Findings show that emotional performance is culturally patterned rather than platform-determined. Eastern livestreams emphasize affective escalation, gestural density, and authority-based authenticity, translating emotion into rapid economic action. Western livestreams foreground relational affect, conversational pacing, and curated aesthetics, supporting slower, trust-based engagement. Across contexts, authenticity emerges not as the absence of performance but as a culturally specific mode of affective staging. Engagement is driven by calibrated affect, visual coherence, and responsive interaction rather than intensity alone. By framing affect as codified performance, this paper positions fashion live shopping as a key site for examining emotional labor, human–technology interaction, and algorithmic governance, offering new insights into cross-cultural digital consumption practices and the socio-technical dynamics of contemporary live commerce.
Benedetta Russo, Sara Kaufman, Matilde De Luca, Clara Bassano
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Fashion Creativity, Regenerative Practices and Visual Communication: an exploratory research
This study investigates Generation Z’s perception of and engagement with sustainable fashion, vintage consumption, and upcycling practices, with the aim of understanding the factors that contribute to the persistence of conformity-driven consumption patterns despite growing environmental awareness. The research explores the gap between declared sustainable values and actual purchasing behavior, examining how circular fashion can be reframed as a tool for identity construction, responsibility, and creative self-expression. The study adopts an exploratory qualitative approach based on an online questionnaire administered to 100 university students aged 18 to 30. The survey combines closed- and open-ended questions addressing purchasing habits, knowledge of sustainable fashion and upcycling, perceived value of vintage garments, barriers to regenerative practices, and willingness to engage in reuse-based solutions. Data were analyzed in aggregated form to identify recurring patterns, critical issues, and opportunities for design intervention. Findings indicate increasing environmental sensitivity among respondents; however, sustainability remains marginal in everyday purchasing decisions, revealing a persistent attitude–behavior gap. Price, aesthetics, and convenience continue to dominate consumption choices. Results also highlight the importance of digital visual communication and participatory tools in enhancing trust, transparency, and engagement. Despite limitations related to sample size and disciplinary concentration, the study offers relevant exploratory insights. Its originality lies in integrating theoretical analysis, empirical research, and the proposal of an interactive digital platform that enables users to actively participate in garment regeneration, transforming sustainability into an experiential, educational, and co-creative process.
Paola Sabbatino, Clara Bassano, Gabriella Sofia Interlandi, Alessandra Di Ronza
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Designing Liquid Heritage: How Hybrid Museum Experiences Shape Co-Created Cultural Value
The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed modern art museums to fundamentally reconsider their relationship with audiences, reshaping how they communicate, engage, and build shared cultural value. This paper looks at how hybrid configurations can assist the formation of a fluid, co-created layer of cultural meaning created by the interactions between visitors and institutions, and extends beyond the physical form of collections: the liquid heritage. This study proposes liquid heritage as an evolving, relational cultural process and therefore offers a design-centered view for conceptualizing and facilitating co-creation in post-COVID museum environments. This paper uses a comparative design-led methodology across museums in Europe, Asia and North America to understand how hybrid experiences are developed; how certain technologies and spatial arrangements are employed; and how they encourage interpretation, participation and shared authorship in contemporary art settings. By analyzing communication patterns, participatory interfaces and selected case studies this study will provide insight into how hybrid encounters can generate relational forms of value, which may be invisible or unrecognized within traditional museal frameworks.
Federica Fatima Rosaria Dias, Giuseppe Di Fuccia, Tommaso Roviello
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Creative Care in Motion: Mediating Institutions Through Design
Care-oriented initiatives often struggle not because they lack value, but because their early forms are difficult to sustain under uncertainty and institutional constraint. This paper examines how creative care—care emerging from underdefined desires or relational improvisation—unfolds within service systems. Drawing on three European cases, it introduces a structural model that reframes care as a trajectory shaped by mediation rather than a discrete service outcome. The analysis shows that sustaining care depends less on isolated solutions than on mediated infrastructures, and that care evolves through translation and provisional stabilization rather than linear implementation. Managing mediation thus emerges as a core organizational capability for sustaining care under uncertainty.Rather than framing creativity as an individual trait or a market-driven outcome, this model positions creative action as a trajectory. Practices begin as personal or collective impulses—dissonance, longing, aesthetic discomfort—and gradually take form through mediation. Drawing from effectuation theory, design mediation, care ethics, and capability theory, the framework conceptualizes creative care as a process shaped by translation across boundaries: between desire and means, between aesthetic disruption and institutional legibility, between informal practice and formal recognition.Three European cases—Circle (UK), WeMi (Milan), and Barcelona’s Superblock—serve as interpretive platforms for analyzing how creative practices move across the quadrant space. Each case demonstrates how symbolic representations, relational networks, participatory storytelling, material infrastructures, and policy environments mediate the evolution of creative care. These cases highlight not only the emergence of new practices but also the fragility of their institutional trajectories: expressive impulses risk dilution when formalized, while grassroots experimentation risks invisibility without translation. The paper argues that design coalitions—assemblages of actors, artifacts, narratives, and infrastructures—play a critical role in sustaining these transitions by holding open ambiguity, enabling proximity, and preventing premature closure.For fashion and cultural institutions, this framework offers a way to reinterpret styling, exhibition, and participatory design as relational care practices that rely on symbolic resonance, shared authorship, and situated meaning. For museums and service organizations, it reframes innovation not as solution delivery but as the crafting of enabling conditions—temporal, spatial, and relational—that allow cultural practices to become livable and collectively held. For the broader creative economy, it positions care as a generative infrastructure: a medium through which aesthetic impulses gain form, publics are composed, and new cultural ecologies emerge.By providing a structural grammar for understanding how creative practices travel across domains of desire, means, and institutional mediation, this paper extends current design research and offers a theoretical foundation for “styled innovation” as a relational and infrastructural process.
Yuriko Sawatani
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Aesthetic Value and Service Ecosystems in the Age of Generative AI
This study neutrally examined the previous literature of generative AI (GenAI) adoption in the advertising sector of services, focusing on consumer perception of AI‑generated images and the implications for corporate communication strategies. Drawing on a review of prior literature, the study synthesizes evidence that the perceptual gap between AI‑ and human‑produced visual content is narrowing, that transparency about AI use and the reasons for its deployment significantly shape consumer attitudes, and that expectation management remains a pivotal factor in shaping reception. The analysis further highlighted how a corporate presentation of AI‑generated assets can influence broader societal norms and value judgments, potentially redefining aesthetic standards within the service industry. By integrating these findings, the paper offers both theoretical contributions—advancing understanding of AI’s impact on aesthetic perception—and practical recommendations for firms seeking to responsibly incorporate GenAI into their marketing strategies.
Miwa Nishinaka, Clara Bassano, Hideaki Takeda
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Reconstructing the Authenticity of Wajima Lacquerware in the Disaster Recovery Process
The 2024 Noto Peninsula Earthquake devastated Wajima City, forcing the Wajima lacquerware community to redefine its craft’s authenticity amid the crisis. This study investigates how stakeholders negotiate tensions between traditional preservation and disaster recovery imperatives. Using an institutional logics perspective, we identify a three-layered Stratification of Authenticity: (1) the Inviolable Core protecting essential material/procedural integrity, (2) the Negotiable Periphery where standards are reinterpreted, and (3) the Peripheral for market innovation. The findings reveal that a rigid adherence to the Core is not an obstacle to recovery, but rather the essential foundation for reconstructing authenticity in the disaster recovery process. Anchoring identity in strict procedural, material, and institutional standards provides the foundational stability needed to safely explore flexibility in the outer layers. This layered structure allows the integration of external resources without compromising the craft's core identity, demonstrating how core rigidity functions as a vital resource for creative reconstruction in traditional industries.
Ryosuke Sakaguchi, Itsuro Kaneyama, Shogo Takie, Kunio Shirahada
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Exploring Necessary Conditions for High and Low Patient Ratings in Online Healthcare Consultation: An LLM-Based Weak Supervision Approach
The prevalence of the "positive rating plateau" in Online Healthcare Consultation (OHC) hinders a clear understanding of the critical constraints required for service improvement. This study aims to identify the necessary conditions for high and low patient ratings. We utilized a dataset of 517,026 patient narrative reviews and adopted an LLM-based weak supervision approach to quantify 12 emotion categories. Subsequently, Necessary Condition Analysis (NCA) was conducted on patient reviews for 625 physicians, to identify necessary emotion categories and their bottleneck levels for high (5-star) and low (1-3 star) ratings. The results revealed that positive emotions are not necessary for high ratings. In contrast, Disappointment and Distrust (d=0.390, p<0.001) emerged as the core necessary condition for low ratings. Additionally, Price Complaints (d=0.196, p<0.001) and Poor Communication (d=0.180, p<0.001) exhibited distinct bottleneck characteristics across varying low-rating rates. Beyond informing a "stepwise improvement strategy" for physicians to place greater emphasis on caring practices and optimizing bilateral service design for platforms, this study establishes a low-cost and high-precision analytical paradigm fusing LLM-based weak supervision with NCA to address the semantic complexity and data sparsity inherent in unstructured medical text.
Hanshu Wang, Xiuzhu Gu
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Development of “Weave Back”: An Integrated System for Human Error Prevention
Near-miss reports capture frontline signals that can prevent accidents, yet many organizations stop at recording and sharing them, and struggle to translate narratives into implementable actions. This study proposes WeaveChain, an integrated framework for converting near-miss narratives into actionable knowledge through three stages—Factors, Mode, and Action—and focuses on the design and evaluation of its action-generation module, WeaveBack. WeaveBack takes as input Performance Shaping Factors (PSFs) extracted upstream and one of 20 human-error modes and generates candidate countermeasures anchored in PSF–mode combinations. To prevent generic, context-insensitive outputs and vigilance-only advice, WeaveBack enforces a structured protocol that crosses ten intervention domains (L/T/H/P/E/C/R/M/O/X) with two intents (human-error prevention; frontline improvement), thereby ensuring 20 comparable candidates per case. We further curated two reference datasets (software-oriented and hardware-oriented, 100 factors each) and refined them through an iterative improvement loop that alternates KPI scoring (11 KPIs, 0–10) and human revision. Rubric-based evaluation conducted by the authors showed that, across all factors in both datasets, the mean scores for KPI1–KPI5 exceeded the threshold (≥5), while KPIs related to external value remained relatively lower. These results suggest that the proposed design can operationalize near-miss learning for small teams by stabilizing a structured candidate set that supports comparison, selection, implementation, and continuous refinement.
Hinata Nogi, Joohyun Lee, Yusaku Okada
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Bridging Institutional Maturity and Public Attention: A Mixed-Methods Study of Telemedicine Institutionalization in Japan
Telemedicine in Japan is undergoing a critical transition from administrative guidance to a formal legal system, yet alignment between institutional maturity (supply side) and public attention (demand side) remains unclear. This study adopted a mixed-methods approach, combining the “Regulatory Framework for Telemedicine” (7 categories) with large language model (LLM)-enhanced topic modeling, to analyze policy documents and 68,481 X (formerly Twitter) posts related to telemedicine from 2019 to 2025. Then, the institutional maturity and public attention across categories were compared. Results revealed distinct interaction patterns between institutional maturity and public attention. First, a stabilization pattern was observed in the Governance and Actions of health institutions and teams categories: improvements in institutional maturity mitigated initial public attention, leading to a transient rise in attention that subsequently declined as practices became normalized. Conversely, a tension pattern persisted in Regulatory aspects, where limited growth institutional maturity failed to address sustained high public attention. Furthermore, a significant misalignment pattern was identified in Cross-cutting principles and human rights, where institutional maturity lagged rapidly rising public attention. We recommend that policymakers prioritize strengthening legal support for vulnerable groups and scenarios attracting high public attention, and transform temporary administrative guidance into formal legislation to bridge gaps between institutional design and public expectations. The developed methods provide a transferable approach for telemedicine institutionalization research in other regions.
Hanshu Wang, Shizu Gotoh, Xiuzhu Gu
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Human–Environment Interaction in a Supermarket Retail Service System: A Field Study
Recent retail research leverages computer vision and indoor positioning to quantify shopper paths and hotspots for layout and merchandising. However, in Asian supermarket alcohol zones, field evidence that contrasts festive and everyday contexts through a human–environment interaction lens remains limited. This study characterizes how spatial configuration, festive displays, and purchase goals shape entry routes, dwell allocation, and brand choice in the alcohol area of a large chain supermarket in Taiwan. Using non-intrusive observation, the area was partitioned into an entrance single-can display, a refrigerated end, an ambient multi-pack section, and promotional pallet stacks; movement sequences and dwell episodes were location-coded across time windows. Festive periods exhibited polarization: entrance-centered exploration versus downstream quick-grab paths with targeted stops near promotions. We propose an observation protocol integrating location coding and behavioral visualization to inform retail service system design and operational planning for alcohol merchandising.
Shui Tsai-Yen, Chien-Hsiung Chen
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings