Department Blog
Department news, events, and snapshots of student life at SVA in New York City.
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INSTIGATIONISM: Inciting Activity in a Sedentary Population
Michael Lee Kenney’s master’s thesis Instigationism is built on a foundation of design work that is intended to incite physical activity in sedentary populations. By combining research insights from the fields of psychology, game design, behavioral economics, and immersive media, Kenney pushes us to reexamine our relationship with exercise.
PYGMALION: Creating systems to empower people with social anxiety disorder
Dayoung’s thesis, Pygmalion, is about creating systems to empower people with social anxiety disorder. She aims to create the Pygmalion effect—also known as the “self-fulfilling prophecy”—to help people with social anxiety. The Pygmalion effect, named after an Ancient Greek myth of a sculptor falling in love with his own works that comes to life, is the phenomenon whereby high expectations and attentions positively affect the outcome of performance.
Alumni Testimonials: What Students Say About the Program After They Graduate
Four years of MFA Products of Design graduates are now out in the world, and here below share their thoughts looking back at the program.
GOOD GRIEF: Inducing eco-anxiety as a call to climate action
Conventional wisdom tells us that eco-anxiety—an indirect mental health impact of climate change—is preventing us from effectively responding to the threat of climate change. This form of anxiety is also marked by an existential worry about the future for oneself, children, and later generations. Karen Vellensky challenges this idea through her thesis, Good Grief: Inducing eco-anxiety as a call to climate action.
EATING TOGETHER: Explorations in an Anti-Social Food System
Will Lentz master’s thesis Eating Together: Explorations in an Anti-Social Food System promotes a resurgence in the social value of communal eating experiences. In a time when isolation and independence are increasingly common, Lentz offers products and provocations aimed at bringing people back together over food.
PLAYING WITH FIREBRANDS: Amplifying Student Voices in Public Education
Andrea Cameron’s master’s thesis, Playing with Firebrands, explores student agency in education. Inspired by the work of progressive educators and student-centered design, the motivation was to incorporate principles from progressive education into public education. The objective was to take the best practices in privatized education and make them accessible to public schools.
What Is Information Architecture?
Information architecture is important to design because it provides the structural underpinning that makes clarity possible. Without thinking about structure, designers can make missteps that lead to things that look good, but aren’t actually good.
WITH, DESPITE, BECAUSE: Living your Best Life with Chronic Pain
After five years of living with a back injury, Alexa Forney made a startling realization: her life with chronic pain was actually better than it had been before. Even more shockingly, her research made it clear that she was not alone.
DIGITAL NATIVES: Promoting Analog Behaviors in Children’s Cognitive Development
In her thesis Digital Natives, Gahee explores designing technologies for children. She uses as her point of departure the notion that young children today "lack analog activities," as they spend most of their time using tablets and cellphones. She argues that existing products in the market are designed to be addictive—creating passive behaviors in children.