A Motive Analysis as a First Step in Designing Technology for the use of Intuition in Criminal Investigation

Investigators occasionally rely on intuitive feelings during crime solving, but have no technological tool targeting directly on mediating this investigation factor. Technology that encourages the sharing and alerting of hunches therefore seemed to be needed. A motive analysis of interviews with criminal investigators was performed as part of an investigation aiming at adding hunches to the criminal investigators’ visualization tools (the project management system to keep track of the investigation). Purpose of the study was to explore how a motive analysis (by revealing the criminal investigators’ motives and attitudes) could contribute in the first phase of the design. The assumption that designing for intuition could be useful, was confirmed by all of the informants. The study gave valuable input to how motive analysis could be used to identify suitable requirements, by resulting in a proposed technological concept supporting the use of intuitive feelings in criminal investigation.