Can you design the perfect condom? Engaging young people to inform safe sexual health practice and innovation. Issue 1 (2nd January 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Cook, Simon M.; Grozdanovski, Laura; Renda, Gianni; Santoso, Devy; Gorkin, Robert; Senior, Kate
• Is Part Of: Sex education. Volume 22:Issue 1(2022)
• Page Start: 110
• Page End: 122
• Publication Date: 2022-01-02
• Subjects: Co-design -- sexual health -- condoms -- participatory design -- youth -- design led innovation; Sex instruction -- Periodicals; Sex (Psychology) -- Periodicals; 613.9071
• DOI: 10.1080/14681811.2021.1891040
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1468-1811

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This paper describes the process of engaging young people in a user centred, co-design strategy to define their perfect condom. Our aims were 1) to find a way to destigmatise discussions about sexuality and contraception and 2) to provide information about what characteristics a perfect condom might embody for adolescents. We used arts-based methods to introduce creativity and enjoyment into discussing sensitive topics related to sexual and reproductive health, which is often avoided in relation to youth and usually nuanced by themes of risk and danger. Using theories of objects becoming things through their sociality, we explored what a condom could be to young people through our method of embedding the condom design process into narratives of young people's lives and integration of these ideas into the development of a next-generation condom.