Children's research illustrations
Now for something a little different!
In a previous life, I used to work in a Developmental Psychology lab. I helped run experiments with children, typically under age 5, studying how they learn and interpret language. It was a fun, extremely creative job.
I don’t know if you’ve ever participated in Psychology studies. I’ve done it both as a student in college (as a requirement for a Psych class) and as an adult (for money and/or a picture of my brain). Sometimes they’re fun, sometimes they are boring, but as an adult, you put that aside for the reward. Kids, however, don’t have that reward mindset. If they don’t like something they’ll let you know. So part of the challenge was designing a study that could get the information we wanted but also keep the kids engaged.
One of the studies I assisted with took place at a children's museum in San Jose. We had a small research room under the stairs (a la Harry Potter) and we’d recruit children and parents off the floor of the museum to participate. The main study I recruited for was an eye-tracking study. We had children watch a short video of actors talking about real toys and made up toys (like a “blicket”!). Making those videos was super fun. We basically turned the lab into a children’s TV studio, but that’s another story. 😉
The museum wanted to have a mini-exhibit for the study: a digital story book about the study that parents could read to children and prepare them for participating. I illustrated pictures for the app and used a "coloring book" style. Here they are!
A parent and child interacting with a regular exhibit.
A researcher approaching a family — we wore names tags to look legit and carried a clipboard with the consent forms.
The child participating in the study. You can see the chair children sat in (a barber's chair so we could raise and lower it) as well as the eye tracker (see the infrared lights at the bottom).
The child back at play, wearing sticker. I don't remember exactly what this was for! Maybe to show that the child had already participated?
It was super fun creating the illustrations the writing the story. A neat instructional design challenge!