What is serendipity really? Some people perceive serendipity as a ‘pleasant incident’, as a ‘happy accident’, as an ‘unexpected event’…but what is it really? How can it be defined? Considering the aforementioned perceptions – some could even call them mini-definitions- serendipity appears to be multi-dimensional and highly personal.

A 3D concept of serendipity could easily involve feeling…space…time…all equally important and fundamental in perceiving something as being serendipitous. At the same time is highly personal as what myself perceives as serendipity may not be the same with what someone else perceives something as being serendipitous. To complicate the things further, the 3D model of serendipity intertwines constantly with the personal perception. For example, serendipitous experience and perception can vary over time under post-evaluation circumstances of a serendipitous event. In this instance, an individual’s personal perception of serendipity can be altered and…here we are!…the event that was once considered serendipitous…is not any more…The reason behind this change could be because individual expectations of an event have been changed over time and/or over space. Some people may even forget serendipitous incidents that occurred at some point in their lives…does this really mean that the value of serendipity for these incidents has been lost?…forgotten? Maybe memory plays also its role in perceiving serendipity – it certainly does in remembering serendipitous moments!

Identifying the requirements of such a complex system is not an easy task. The main aim one needs to have in an attempt to identify the user needs of such a system – a system that accommodates and supports ‘chance encounters in the space of ideas’ – is to always have in mind the qualities and characteristics of ‘serendipity’ concept. And I have mentioned already that the character of ‘serendipity’ is multi-dimensional and personal.

Coming myself from a multi-dimensional and multi-disciplinary background (which involves Computer Science, Systems Engineering, Design and Evaluation of Advanced Interactive Systems, Operational Research and Psychology), I come to highly appreciate the independent, personalised (sometimes subjective) views of certain phenomena and theories in different disciplines. As research itself –the world itself!- provides an open field of experiences and ideas exchange, in a similar manner, this freedom and availability of sources and resources needs to be maintained when thinking about the user requirements and needs of a serendipity-support system.

My role in this research project is to gather and extract user requirements, contribute to the design process through the conduction of appropriate studies and evaluate the system.

 

Dr. Genovefa Kefalidou

Research Fellow in Horizon Research Institute/Human Factors Group

University of Nottingham