Colin Watson

My research interests are the effects on individuals and communities by digitisation of national government services. Government service delivery is increasingly shifting online in an effort to increase adoption and efficiency, but citizens have not been central to their design, and strategies to correct difficulties for citizens often address the problem from the perspective of user inadequacies. These matters are particularly pertinent to implementing social protection policies supporting those with higher levels of socio-economic deprivation, who may be in precarious situations, and who are among those most digitally-excluded.

In my MRes Digital Civics project I examined how to help citizens make better use of resource-limited advice and support appointments. In particular I studied how to assist claimants of the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) health/disability benefit gather more accurate and impartial health assessment information to support their claims. This involved co-designing PIP Kit with service users and practitioners, comprising digital and non-digital components, to help people recollect and discuss how health conditions affect their own daily lives and mobility.

My PhD examined the negative effects (harms) on individuals and their communities using, as case studies, two UK transactional welfare benefit services Universal Credit (UC) and Personal Independent Payment (PIP), which deliver policies providing for income and disability-related social protection financial payments respectively,. The extent of digitisation, providing access via self-service remote channels, and pattern of access by citizen claimants is quite different for these, but are the two most commonly-welfare benefits claimed by working-age adults, and were both deemed to be digital transformation exemplars by the government. My research examined how claimant-articulated digital-related harms arise, and whether alternative design choices could reduce harms. This involved the design and evaluation of two digital intervention prototypes to generate further knowledge about how harms arise in service ecosystems.

In addition to my academic publications, other information about my PhD research is published at https://digitalbenefits.uk/