Project Overview
This thesis explored how smell can work as an interaction material in small group second-language activities. Instead of measuring language performance, I focused on participation: who speaks, how people respond, when hesitation appears, and how a group builds meaning together around an ambiguous sensory material.
My design question was not "does smell make people learn faster?" It was "how does smell change the way people participate, interpret, and collaborate?"
The Problem I Investigated
Most language activities rely on words, images, or speech. Smell is usually treated as background atmosphere, even though it can trigger memory, uncertainty, and personal interpretation. I wanted to understand whether smell could become an active material for social interaction, especially in adult second-language contexts where participation matters.
My Role
- Designed the research question and study structure.
- Created and iterated smell-based group activities across six sessions.
- Ran activities at Hyllie Park, Kvarnby, and Glokala folkhögskolor.
- Collected data through observation, video/audio recording, field notes, and interviews.
- Analyzed participation through initiation, response, collaborative building, and withdrawal.
Research and Design Method
I used a Research through Design approach. The project was not one final prototype. It was a sequence of designed activities where each session taught me something about smell, rules, turn-taking, and group interaction.
- Session 1: tested a simple familiar smell and one shared sentence.
- Session 2: shifted toward collaborative storytelling and unfamiliar smells.
- Session 3: added game structure and competition.
- Session 4: removed competition and moved toward playful interaction.
- Session 5: tested structured turn-taking to support collaborative building.
- Session 6: introduced shifting roles and more unpredictable social play.
Design Thinking in the Process
One important learning was that smell alone does not create better participation. The structure around the smell matters. When the activity became too competitive, people focused more on performance. When the rules supported storytelling and turn-taking, the same kind of ambiguity helped participants compare interpretations, respond to each other, and build ideas together.
Key Findings
- Smell changed the form of participation rather than simply increasing the amount of talk.
- Familiar smells created faster and more confident responses.
- Unfamiliar smells created more hesitation, interpretation, and negotiation.
- Silence was not always disengagement. Sometimes it showed active thinking and meaning-making.
- Small rule changes had a large effect on collaboration, turn-taking, and response patterns.
What This Shows About My UX Practice
This project shows how I think as a designer: I start from a human behavior question, create a testable situation, observe what actually happens, and let the findings reshape the next iteration. I do not only design screens or objects. I design conditions for interaction and study how people make sense of them together.