Dennis Cheatham
- Experience Design.
- Futures Thinking.
- Learning Sciences.
Most of what shapes our lives is invisible: the products, services, and systems that quietly determine how we encounter the world. I make those forces visible. I help people design experiences that matter. And I mentor the next generation of designers learning to build futures worth living in.
Front of Mind
Coding with AI and AI Literacy
Whether a person is drinking coffee, plowing a field, or telling their sister they love them, what people use to do these is not the point—their experience while using them is what matters. As much as designers like to celebrate their beautifully crafted or technologically advanced work, if the design gets in the way, it fails.
I examine the interplay between contexts, people, and design to better understand these experiences—why they fail or flourish, their inner workings, and how to design for better experiences.
Active Research Areas
My work pursues three goals that all connect with experiences.
Experience Design
Building products, services, and systems grounded in how human emotion, reasoning, and environmental context shape meaningful, supportive, and memorable experiences.
Futures Thinking
Using systemic thinking and practical imagination to explore how AI and emerging technologies reshape human experiences—illuminating opportunities and navigating threats for authentically human futures.
Learning Sciences
Developing pedagogies and curricular structures that prepare experience-centered designers to lead with empathy, adapt as communities evolve, and partner effectively across disciplines and contexts.
Featured Content
AI-Proof Learning: Assessing Process, Not Product
Field Notes
Regular thoughts on ways design impacts experiences in real time.
Latest Stories
Updates and stories on this site.
Recent Scholarship & Speaking
Recent presentations and publications.
Design Workbench Project Websites
Project websites showcase work by transdisciplinary teams exploring ways design research and co-creation can shape experiences.
Learning Lab
Innovations in teaching and learning result when educators meld an iterative design process into creating teaching and learning experiences. On this site, learn about in-process projects and discoveries as they develop.
Horizon Points
This site explores how AI impacts peoples’ experiences. As these technologies permeate every corner of society, knowing how to use them and their consequences is paramount for creators, their partners, and associated stakeholders.
Experience Design Factors
XDF is a practical framework that can help teams examine matters that lead to co-creating memorable experiences.
Design Workbench
Design Workbench is a website network that demystifies how products, services, and systems create memorable experiences. When designers prioritize usability and delight in the things we create, we demonstrate care and concern for people who use these things.
Experience Design Projects
Project work in experience design.
Living Values
Everyone deserves dignity—in life and after they die. Living Values is a design research project to learn how people prefer to talk about their end-of-life choices, and co-create tools that empower them to record advance care planning decisions for their last days and beyond.
