Event evaluation and design : human experience mapping

This article reports a phenomenological evaluation of a small-scale cause-related event. Three complimentary methods were applied to the interpretation of data obtained from interviewing participants who took part in an event involving the experience of sleeping on the streets with homeless people in a city in the UK. The participant experience data were first explored by applying a simple multiphasic interpretation. A second layer of exploration involved separating the data into six human experience dimensions. A third and final interpretation method involved the collaborative construction of a schematic map as a composite-summative expression of the data. In order to further explore this collaborative schematic data interpretation approach, and its potential for application in event design, experience mapping has subsequently undergone further field trials with event experience designers from a range of private and public organizations across the globe, notably Singapore, Prague, Hong Kong, India, and the UK.