The organising committee of the 8th International Design & Emotion Conference, London, 11th-14th September 2012, is very pleased to invite you to participate in this conference. This conference is a forum held every other year where practitioners, academics and industry leaders meet and exchange knowledge and insights concerning the cross-disciplinary field of design and emotion. We are looking for researchers, academics and practitioners to submit proposals for the following:

Themes and topics

While Design & Emotion is the overarching focus of the conference—allowing us to consider all aspects of the relationship between human experience and design understood in its widest senses—the theme this year is “Out of Control”.

For a number of years, uncertainty, crisis and chaos have been keywords describing the experience of many of us. A world driven by uncertainty, crisis and chaos demands different responses from design (as a community, a practice and a process). On one hand we can mitigate against these—designing systems which can withstand, or manage, the challenges they produce. Here there is a focus upon design as a “problem-solving” activity. On the other, we can use them as springboards to a creative future. In this way, design as “opportunity mapping” becomes important.

We would like to encompass both of these approaches to design and to examine how they impact upon, or are generated by, the whole spectrum of human emotion experienced at the macro (socio-cultural), micro (personal), meta (philosophical), processural (methodological) and strategic levels.

This conference is open to any theoretical, empirical or methodological work on Design & Emotion and we are particularly interested in receiving papers from researchers, academics and practitioners in the following topic areas (though they are by no means exhaustive and other work relevant to the theme will be considered):

Society/Culture
Socially Responsive/Responsible Design
Design for BehaviouralChange
Design & Space/Environment
Design for Digital Media
Corporate Social Responsibility

The Self/The Object
Design & Identity
Design & Well-Being (inc. food, healthcare & love)
Design & Illusion, Fake & Fraud
User Experience (inc. Human Factors & HCI)
Experience Design

The Philosophical
Design without Emotion
Design, Affect & the Materiality of Experience
Design, Magic & Enchantment

Processes, Methodologies, Tools & Methods
Research Methodologies
Theoretical Foundations
Empirical Approaches

Design, Strategy & Innovation
Design & the Future (foresight/trends)
Designing Services
Business Experience
Branding

Important Dates

1st February 2012 Papers & Case Study submissions
15th April 2012 Notification of Acceptance Papers & Case Studies
1st May 2012 Workshops/Masterclasses submissions
15th May 2012 Final Paper submissions
1st June 2012 Notification of Acceptance Workshops/Masterclasses
15th June 2012 Final Acceptance
15th July 2012 Early Registration
11th September 2012 Workshops/Masterclasses
12th-14th September 2012 Conference