A Practical Guide to Participatory Design Sessions for the Development of Information Visualizations: Tutorial

Participatory design is an increasingly common informatics method to engage intended audiences in the development of health-related resources. Participatory design is particularly helpful for developing information visualizations that aim to improve health outcomes by means of improved comprehension, communication or engagement, and subsequent behavior changes. Existing literature on participatory design lacks the practical details that influence the success of the method and does not address emergent issues, such as strategies to enhance internet-based data collection. In this tutorial, our objective is to provide practical guidance on how to prepare for, conduct, and analyze participatory design sessions for information visualization. The primary audience for this tutorial is research teams, but this guide is relevant for organizations and other health professionals looking to design visualizations for their patient populations, as they can use this guide as a procedural manual. This start-to-finish guide provides information on how to prepare for design sessions by setting objectives and applying theoretical foundations, planning design sessions to match project goals, conducting design sessions in different formats with varying populations, and carrying out effective analysis. We also address how the methods in this guide can be implemented in the context of resource constraints. This tutorial contains a glossary of relevant terms, pros and cons of variations in the type of design session, an informed consent template, a preparation checklist, a sample design session guide and selection of useful design session prompts, and examples of how surveys can supplement the design process.