Traditional prototyping is an essential step in the innovation process, allowing designers to create mockups quickly, using low-cost materials, in order to:

• Answer important design questions.

• Gather feedback on new ideas.

• Find and address imperfections in a design before resources are devoted to production.

• Explore a number of possible solutions before committing resources to just one.

Embodied prototyping uses physical movement and spatial interaction to explore emotional and experiential questions, too. By creating prototypes where the person is at the center, embodied prototyping gives designers a sense of how a product or service might evoke emotion—and how its impact could be refined to create more memorable experiences that are capable of meeting users where they are.

Embodied prototyping might help designers shape health care experiences that:

• Convey feelings of safety and comfort to a child before a scary procedure.

• Shape a sense of privacy that allows teenage patients to visit women’s health clinics.

• Help clinicians form stronger bonds of trust with elderly patients.

• Instill a sense of curiosity—rather than dread—about the implementation of new technologies in a lab.

During the Penn Master of Health Care Innovation’s 2025 on-campus Seminar, human-centered designer and health care innovation leader Maya Greenshpan led a workshop that added embodied prototyping to students’ toolbox of design thinking skills. How, she asked, might we hone the emotional impact of health care experiences for clinicians, caregivers, and patients to make health care not just more effective, but more inviting?

To demonstrate the power of prototyping emotions, Greenshpan asked students to use Lego bricks to sculpt the essence and impact of a memorable experience. In a 10-minute exercise, students built their worst-ever travel story and used the model to vivify the emotional experience for an audience of peers. One student’s doorway model, for example, evoked the frustration of being trapped inside an airplane with a broken hatch. Another, made only of flat sections, illustrated the letdown of a presentation to investors that fell flat because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The exercise highlights that neither the person nor the object is sufficient to tell the story. It is the interaction between the two that generates—and lets us observe—the impact.

Building on what they learned from that exercise, Greenshpan then asked groups of students to prototype a feeling. They used everyday objects like toys, office supplies, and their own bodies to evoke intangible concepts like safety, excitement, dignity, and a sense of control.

Students collaborated to create experiences to share with their peers. And they gathered feedback on what elements of their designs hit home, and where they could use more work. Did the group of students that had onlookers direct them in a game of Simon Says successfully evoke the feeling of control? Did the group that pantomimed opening presents on Christmas morning effectively convey excitement?

Students used materials with no intrinsic emotional impact. Then, through their interactions with the materials—and their audience—they imbued their creation with emotional substance.

The exercise, in other words, illustrated the power of an embodied prototype to garner more effective feedback on a design by gauging more than just usability. And it highlighted the potential of vulnerability—of taking a risk with a very personal first draft—to help designers better spot how we can transform day-to-day interactions into meaningful experiences.

Because the stakes in health care are so high, and because health care delivery is so resource-intensive, core questions for innovators often revolve around quality, safety, and efficiency. Embodied prototyping helps us remember to also design for the less tangible elements—like the delight, comfort, and intrigue a project might provoke. And it helps us see that those elements are essential for success.

Adoption of health care innovations hinges, Greenshpan tells us, not only on what we make, but also on how we make people feel. Emotion matters in health care environments, and it is a design element that we can test for and improve. We can use embodied prototyping to test the emotional impact of designs quickly and cheaply. And by doing so we can improve the chances that our best health care ideas will succeed.

Move beyond the basics of prototyping and enhance your design thinking skills by taking Translating Ideas into Outcomes with Lauren Hahn, Christina O’Malley, and Sarah Rottenberg. And explore the Master of Health Care Innovation to learn how you can become a part of our growing network of health care innovators.