Human Technology Relations | Master's track | Industrial Design Engineering

Become an industrial design engineer who can create products and solutions that come as close as possible to what people really need and want.

Some products have been beautifully designed and effectively engineered to solve a problem, yet they fail to connect with the deeper concerns and aims of the people using them. So how do you make sure your solutions combine a great look and feel with that vital human touch? What does it take to create technology – whether digital, mechanical or other – that gets as close as possible to what human beings truly want from the products and solutions they use? That’s what the Master’s track Human Technology Relations (HTR) is all about. You will grow to be a people-oriented industrial design engineer, by gaining expertise in understanding the needs and wants of people and converting your insights into feasible product design solutions.

What to expect?

This track covers the human perspective of design engineering in the widest sense, from the individual, and social to the societal level. For example, you might design an application to help people with autism expand their living environment, but you can also come up with a solution to counter antisocial behaviour in traffic. This track teaches you how to design for behaviour change and also what ethical questions are involved: to what extent can you intervene in the lives of human beings?

Example of courses you follow during this Master's track:

During the course Design for Behaviour Change you learn how products, innovations and technologies influence behaviour and you apply this knowledge to change people’s lives for the better at the crossroads of design and psychology.
The course Multisensory Design teaches you that addressing a broader range of the sensory spectrum can make products more appealing and effective. Especially vulnerable or hard-to-reach user groups, like people suffering from dementia, can benefit a lot.
As a designer, you can help shape the future with the solutions you design. In the course Create the Future you get to explore the accompanying responsibility and see how bright (or not) this future can be.

In this Master’s track, you will gain insights into the problems, aims, concerns and aspirations of human beings and learn how to translate these into feasible product design solutions.

What will you learn?

As a graduate of this Master's track, you have acquired specific, scientific knowledge, skills and values, which you can put to good use in your future job.

Knowledge
After completing this Master’s track, you:
- know how to research and address the needs of individuals, groups of people and society;
- know how to influence behaviour and the interaction with technology;
- have a thorough understanding of good design from a historic perspective.
Skills
After successfully finishing this Master’s track, you are able to:
- design for compelling experiences and interactions;
- incorporate the knowledge of users in the design process;
- use technology to fulfil the needs and desires of people and society.
Values
After completing this Master’s track, you have:
- developed a human and society-centred perspective and use this when designing products and services;
- a sense of social responsibility in designing new products or improving existing ones (by taking subjects such as sustainability or privacy into consideration);
- developed your own ideals and beliefs concerning our society and work towards these in designing new products.

Other master's and specialisations

Is this Master’s track not exactly what you are looking for? Choose another IDE-track or take a look at these master's and their specialisations:

Courses & research