Wake up, watch TV, eat food, sleep, and that’s all : Reimagining research storytelling through the uncertainty of elderhood and the time of ‘missing purpose’

“Wake up, watch TV, eat food, sleep, that’s all” - that’s how an 80-year-old described his day. Though his financial and health needs were met, what he was really saying was "there's nothing left to wake up to."
We talk about childhood as a time of hope and possibility. We see adulthood as a time to build careers, families, and futures. But what about elderhood? What elders often lose is not care, but purpose. And, purpose is rarely how society imagines this stage of life.
These elderly voices reveal the intricate relationship between routine, autonomy, and purpose. To synthesize and communicate these insights, we applied our "Mindsets Synthesis Framework" - a methodology we've refined over the past 3 years, which better addresses the complex embodied nature of human intelligences of thinking, doing and being.
We truly believe that research is more than presenting findings; it’s about crafting a narrative that truly provokes thought. We'll introduce you to a research storytelling framework, from "create your own adventure" methods to research zines and cards that you can use to make your findings come alive for stakeholders. You’ll learn how this new method of research storytelling makes the "unseen" - seen and the "unspoken" - felt, transforming how you communicate your work.