118 research outputs found
Ambiguity for Social Self-tracking Practices: Exploring an emerging design space
Ambiguity is gaining attention in self-tracking research as a means to go beyond the mere quantification of body signals. Recent research has suggested that ambiguity can be used even to enable social connection mediated by personal data. To explore this design space more widely, we organized two design workshops with a total of 67 participants. In this paper, we present three design concepts, as outcomes of the workshops, which use ambiguity to enable social self-tracking practices. We then discuss how these concepts demonstrate the potential of ambiguity to encourage collective sense-making, directly impact the user’s social relationships, and offer multifaceted perspectives on reality
Exploring the Role of Data-supported Social Interaction manifested through Public Displays
This paper presents the early findings of studies in the
role of data informing the interaction between the user,
public and public display. It focuses on exploring how
different strategies amplify and stimulate these datasupported
interactions. Building on the work by
Tomisch et al (13), we establish a taxonomy for databased
features under the category of key elements in
urban visualisations: 1) addressed topics, 2) input
technologies, and 3) visualisation output. We analyse
how these factors facilitate social interactions
meaningfully through case studies of previous projects
developed and implemented by Media Architecture
research community. We suggest that data properties
and manifestation play a significant role in 1) sustaining
attraction to passers-by 2) enriching public
understandings of display, and 3) encouraging diverse
participation
Unpacking Non-Dualistic Design: The Soma Design Case
We report on a somaesthetic design workshop and the subsequent analytical work aiming to demystify what is entailed in a non-dualistic design stance on embodied interaction and why a first-person engagement is crucial to its unfoldings. However, as we will uncover through a detailed account of our process, these first-person engagements are deeply entangled with second- and third-person perspectives, sometimes even overlapping. The analysis furthermore reveals some strategies for bridging the body-mind divide by attending to our inner universe and dissolving or traversing dichotomies between inside and outside; individual and social; body and technology. By detailing the creative process, we show how soma design becomes a process of designing with and through kinesthetic experience, in turn letting us confront several dualisms that run like fault lines through HCI's engagement with embodied interaction
NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION WITH PHYSIOLOGICAL SENSORS. THE AESTHETIC DOMAIN OF WEARABLES AND NEURAL NETWORKS
Historically, communication implies the transfer of information between bodies, yet this
phenomenon is constantly adapting to new technological and cultural standards. In a
digital context, it’s commonplace to envision systems that revolve around verbal modalities.
However, behavioural analysis grounded in psychology research calls attention to
the emotional information disclosed by non-verbal social cues, in particular, actions that
are involuntary. This notion has circulated heavily into various interdisciplinary computing
research fields, from which multiple studies have arisen, correlating non-verbal
activity to socio-affective inferences. These are often derived from some form of motion
capture and other wearable sensors, measuring the ‘invisible’ bioelectrical changes that
occur from inside the body.
This thesis proposes a motivation and methodology for using physiological sensory
data as an expressive resource for technology-mediated interactions. Initialised from a
thorough discussion on state-of-the-art technologies and established design principles
regarding this topic, then applied to a novel approach alongside a selection of practice
works to compliment this. We advocate for aesthetic experience, experimenting with
abstract representations. Atypically from prevailing Affective Computing systems, the
intention is not to infer or classify emotion but rather to create new opportunities for rich
gestural exchange, unconfined to the verbal domain.
Given the preliminary proposition of non-representation, we justify a correspondence
with modern Machine Learning and multimedia interaction strategies, applying an iterative,
human-centred approach to improve personalisation without the compromising
emotional potential of bodily gesture. Where related studies in the past have successfully
provoked strong design concepts through innovative fabrications, these are typically limited
to simple linear, one-to-one mappings and often neglect multi-user environments;
we foresee a vast potential. In our use cases, we adopt neural network architectures to
generate highly granular biofeedback from low-dimensional input data.
We present the following proof-of-concepts: Breathing Correspondence, a wearable
biofeedback system inspired by Somaesthetic design principles; Latent Steps, a real-time auto-encoder to represent bodily experiences from sensor data, designed for dance performance;
and Anti-Social Distancing Ensemble, an installation for public space interventions,
analysing physical distance to generate a collective soundscape. Key findings are
extracted from the individual reports to formulate an extensive technical and theoretical
framework around this topic. The projects first aim to embrace some alternative perspectives
already established within Affective Computing research. From here, these concepts
evolve deeper, bridging theories from contemporary creative and technical practices with
the advancement of biomedical technologies.Historicamente, os processos de comunicação implicam a transferência de informação
entre organismos, mas este fenómeno está constantemente a adaptar-se a novos padrões
tecnológicos e culturais. Num contexto digital, é comum encontrar sistemas que giram
em torno de modalidades verbais. Contudo, a análise comportamental fundamentada
na investigação psicológica chama a atenção para a informação emocional revelada por
sinais sociais não verbais, em particular, acções que são involuntárias. Esta noção circulou
fortemente em vários campos interdisciplinares de investigação na área das ciências da
computação, dos quais surgiram múltiplos estudos, correlacionando a actividade nãoverbal
com inferências sócio-afectivas. Estes são frequentemente derivados de alguma
forma de captura de movimento e sensores “wearable”, medindo as alterações bioeléctricas
“invisíveis” que ocorrem no interior do corpo.
Nesta tese, propomos uma motivação e metodologia para a utilização de dados sensoriais
fisiológicos como um recurso expressivo para interacções mediadas pela tecnologia.
Iniciada a partir de uma discussão aprofundada sobre tecnologias de ponta e princípios
de concepção estabelecidos relativamente a este tópico, depois aplicada a uma nova abordagem,
juntamente com uma selecção de trabalhos práticos, para complementar esta.
Defendemos a experiência estética, experimentando com representações abstractas. Contrariamente
aos sistemas de Computação Afectiva predominantes, a intenção não é inferir
ou classificar a emoção, mas sim criar novas oportunidades para uma rica troca gestual,
não confinada ao domínio verbal.
Dada a proposta preliminar de não representação, justificamos uma correspondência
com estratégias modernas de Machine Learning e interacção multimédia, aplicando uma
abordagem iterativa e centrada no ser humano para melhorar a personalização sem o
potencial emocional comprometedor do gesto corporal. Nos casos em que estudos anteriores
demonstraram com sucesso conceitos de design fortes através de fabricações
inovadoras, estes limitam-se tipicamente a simples mapeamentos lineares, um-para-um,
e muitas vezes negligenciam ambientes multi-utilizadores; com este trabalho, prevemos
um potencial alargado. Nos nossos casos de utilização, adoptamos arquitecturas de redes
neurais para gerar biofeedback altamente granular a partir de dados de entrada de baixa dimensão.
Apresentamos as seguintes provas de conceitos: Breathing Correspondence, um sistema
de biofeedback wearable inspirado nos princípios de design somaestético; Latent
Steps, um modelo autoencoder em tempo real para representar experiências corporais
a partir de dados de sensores, concebido para desempenho de dança; e Anti-Social Distancing
Ensemble, uma instalação para intervenções no espaço público, analisando a
distância física para gerar uma paisagem sonora colectiva. Os principais resultados são
extraídos dos relatórios individuais, para formular um quadro técnico e teórico alargado
para expandir sobre este tópico. Os projectos têm como primeiro objectivo abraçar algumas
perspectivas alternativas às que já estão estabelecidas no âmbito da investigação
da Computação Afectiva. A partir daqui, estes conceitos evoluem mais profundamente,
fazendo a ponte entre as teorias das práticas criativas e técnicas contemporâneas com o
avanço das tecnologias biomédicas
Designing gaze-based interaction for pervasive public displays
The last decade witnessed an increasing adoption of public interactive displays.
Displays can now be seen in many public areas, such as shopping malls, and train stations. There is also a growing trend towards using large public displays especially in airports, urban areas, universities and libraries.
Meanwhile, advances in eye tracking and visual computing promise straightforward integration of eye tracking on these displays for both: 1) monitoring the user's visual behavior to evaluate different aspects of the display, such as measuring the visual attention of passersby, and for 2) interaction purposes, such as allowing users to provide input, retrieve content, or transfer data using their eye movements.
Gaze is particularly useful for pervasive public displays. In addition to being natural and intuitive, eye gaze can be detected from a distance, bringing interactivity to displays that are physically unreachable. Gaze reflects the user's intention and visual interests, and its subtle nature makes it well-suited for public interactions where social embarrassment and privacy concerns might hinder the experience.
On the downside, eye tracking technologies have traditionally been developed for desktop settings, where a user interacts from a stationary position and for a relatively long period of time. Interaction with public displays is fundamentally different and hence poses unique challenges when employing eye tracking. First, users of public displays are dynamic; users could approach the display from different directions, and interact from different positions or even while moving. This means that gaze-enabled displays should not expect users to be stationary at a specific position, but instead adapt to users' ever-changing position in front of the display. Second, users of public displays typically interact for short durations, often for a few seconds only. This means that contrary to desktop settings, public displays cannot afford requiring users to perform time-consuming calibration prior to interaction.
In this publications-based dissertation, we first report on a review of challenges of interactive public displays, and discuss the potential of gaze in addressing these challenges. We then showcase the implementation and in-depth evaluation of two applications where gaze is leveraged to address core problems in today's public displays. The first presents an eye-based solution, EyePACT, that tackles the parallax effect which is often experienced on today's touch-based public displays.
We found that EyePACT significantly improves accuracy even with varying degrees of parallax. The second is a novel multimodal system, GTmoPass, that combines gaze and touch input for secure user authentication on public displays. GTmoPass was found to be highly resilient to shoulder surfing, thermal attacks and smudge attacks, thereby offering a secure solution to an important problem on public displays.
The second part of the dissertation explores specific challenges of gaze-based interaction with public displays. First, we address the user positioning problem by means of active eye tracking. More specifically, we built a novel prototype, EyeScout, that dynamically moves the eye tracker based on the user's position without augmenting the user. This, in turn, allowed us to study and understand gaze-based interaction with public displays while walking, and when approaching the display from different positions. An evaluation revealed that EyeScout is well perceived by users, and improves the time needed to initiate gaze interaction by 62% compared to state-of-the-art. Second, we propose a system, Read2Calibrate, for calibrating eye trackers implicitly while users read text on displays. We found that although text-based calibration is less accurate than traditional methods, it integrates smoothly while reading and thereby more suitable for public displays. Finally, through our prototype system, EyeVote, we show how to allow users to select textual options on public displays via gaze without calibration. In a field deployment of EyeVote, we studied the trade-off between accuracy and selection speed when using calibration-free selection techniques. We found that users of public displays value faster interactions over accurate ones, and are willing to correct system errors in case of inaccuracies.
We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings on the design of gaze-based interaction for public displays, and how our work can be adapted for other domains apart from public displays, such as on handheld mobile devices.In den letzten zehn Jahren wurden vermehrt interaktive Displays in öffentlichen Bereichen wie Einkaufszentren, Flughäfen und Bahnhöfen eingesetzt. Große öffentliche Displays finden sich zunehmend in städtischen Gebieten, beispielsweise in Universitäten und Bibliotheken. Fortschritte in der Eye-Tracking-Technologie und der Bildverarbeitung versprechen eine einfache Integration von Eye-Tracking auf diesen Displays. So kann zum einen das visuelle Verhalten der Benutzer verfolgt und damit ein Display nach verschiedenen Aspekten evaluiert werden. Zum anderen eröffnet Eye-Tracking auf öffentlichen Displays neue Interaktionsmöglichkeiten. Blickbasierte Interaktion ist besonders nützlich für Bildschirme im allgegenwärtigen öffentlichen Raum. Der Blick bietet mehr als eine natürliche und intuitive Interaktionsmethode: Blicke können aus der Ferne erkannt und somit für Interaktion mit sonst unerreichbaren Displays genutzt werden. Aus der Interaktion mit dem Blick (Gaze) lassen sich Absichten und visuelle Interessen der Benutzer ableiten. Dadurch eignet es sich besonders für den öffentlichen Raum, wo Nutzer möglicherweise Datenschutzbedenken haben könnten oder sich bei herkömmlichen Methoden gehemmt fühlen würden in der Öffentlichkeit mit den Displays zu interagieren. Dadurch wird ein uneingeschränktes Nutzererlebnis ermöglicht.
Eye-Tracking-Technologien sind jedoch in erster Linie für Desktop-Szenarien entwickelt worden, bei denen ein Benutzer für eine relativ lange Zeitspanne in einer stationären Position mit dem System interagiert. Die Interaktion mit öffentlichen Displays ist jedoch grundlegend anders. Daher gilt es völlig neuartige Herausforderungen zu bewältigen, wenn Eye-Tracking eingesetzt wird. Da sich Nutzer von öffentlichen Displays bewegen, können sie sich dem Display aus verschiedenen Richtungen nähern und sogar währenddessen mit dem Display interagieren. Folglich sollten "Gaze-enabled Displays" nicht davon ausgehen, dass Nutzer sich stets an einer bestimmten Position befinden, sondern sollten sich an die ständig wechselnde Position des Nutzers anpassen können. Zum anderen interagieren Nutzer von öffentlichen Displays üblicherweise nur für eine kurze Zeitspannen von ein paar Sekunden. Eine zeitaufwändige Kalibrierung durch den Nutzer vor der eigentlichen Interaktion ist hier im Gegensatz zu Desktop-Szenarien also nicht adäquat.
Diese kumulative Dissertation überprüft zunächst die Herausforderungen interaktiver öffentlicher Displays und diskutiert das Potenzial von blickbasierter Interaktion zu deren Bewältigung. Anschließend wird die Implementierung und eingehende Evaluierung von zwei beispielhaften Anwendungen vorgestellt, bei denen Nutzer durch den Blick mit öffentlichen Displays interagieren. Daraus ergeben sich weitere greifbare Vorteile der blickbasierten Interaktion für öffentliche Display-Kontexte. Bei der ersten Anwendung, EyePACT, steht der Parallaxeneffekt im Fokus, der heutzutage häufig ein Problem auf öffentlichen Displays darstellt, die über Berührung (Touch) gesteuert werden. Die zweite Anwendung ist ein neuartiges multimodales System, GTmoPass, das Gaze- und Touch-Eingabe zur sicheren Benutzerauthentifizierung auf öffentlichen Displays kombiniert. GTmoPass ist sehr widerstandsfähig sowohl gegenüber unerwünschten fremden Blicken als auch gegenüber sogenannten thermischen Angriffen und Schmierangriffen. Es bietet damit eine sichere Lösung für ein wichtiges Sicherheits- und Datenschutzproblem auf öffentlichen Displays.
Der zweite Teil der Dissertation befasst sich mit spezifischen Herausforderungen der Gaze-Interaktion mit öffentlichen Displays. Zuerst wird der Aspekt der Benutzerpositionierung durch aktives Eye-Tracking adressiert. Der neuartige Prototyp EyeScout bewegt den Eye-Tracker passend zur Position des Nutzers, ohne dass dieser dafür mit weiteren Geräten oder Sensoren ausgestattet werden muss. Dies ermöglicht blickbasierte Interaktion mit öffentlichen Displays auch in jenen Situationen zu untersuchen und zu verstehen, in denen Nutzer in Bewegung sind und sich dem Display von verschiedenen Positionen aus nähern. Zweitens wird das System Read2Calibrate präsentiert, das Eye-Tracker implizit kalibriert, während Nutzer Texte auf Displays lesen. Der Prototyp EyeVote zeigt, wie man die Auswahl von Textantworten auf öffentlichen Displays per Blick ohne Kalibrierung ermöglichen kann. In einer Feldstudie mit EyeVote wird der Kompromiss zwischen Genauigkeit und Auswahlgeschwindigkeit unter der Verwendung kalibrierungsfreier Auswahltechniken untersucht. Die Implikationen der Ergebnisse für das Design von blickbasierter Interaktion öffentlicher Displays werden diskutiert. Abschließend wird erörtert wie die verwendete Methodik auf andere Bereiche, z.B. auf mobilie Geräte, angewendet werden kann
NEUVis: Comparing Affective and Effective Visualisation
Data visualisations are useful for providing insight from complex scientific data. However, even with visualisation, scientific research is difficult for non-scientists to comprehend. When developed by designers in collaboration with scientists, data visualisation can be used to articulate scientific data in a way that non-experts can understand. Creating human-centred visualisations is a unique challenge, and there are no frameworks to support their design. In response, this thesis presents a practice-led study investigating design methods that can be used to develop Non-Expert User Visualisations (NEUVis), data visualisations for a general public, and the response that people have to different kinds of NEUVis. For this research, two groups of ten users participated in quantitative studies, informed by Yvonna Lincoln and Egon Guba’s method of Naturalistic Inquiry, which asked non-scientists to express their cognitive and emotional response to NEUVis using different media. The three different types of visualisations were infographics, 3D animations and an interactive installation. The installation used in the study, entitled 18S rDNA, was developed and evaluated as part of this research using John Zimmerman’s Research Through Design methodology. 18S rDNA embodies the knowledge and design methods that were developed for this research, and provided an opportunity for explication of the entire NEUVis design process. The research findings indicate that developing visualisations for the non-expert audience requires a new process, different to the way scientists visualise data. The result of this research describes how creative practitioners collaborate with primary researchers and presents a new human-centred design thinking model for NEUVis. This model includes two design tools. The first tool helps designers merge user needs with data they wish to visualise. The second tool helps designers take that merged information and begin an iterative, user-centred design process
Advancing public health in the context of natural hazards : normalising preparedness within a framework of adapted protection motivation theory
This research sought to discover and recommend proactive strategies to strengthen
and improve human safety and well-being in a changing climate of natural hazards.
This thesis documents the rationale, process and outcomes of that research.
People’s ability to navigate their daily lives within an environment of worsening
natural hazards is an adaptive public health and safety priority - given the predicted
global increase in frequency and severity of extreme weather events. There is an
urgent need to strengthen and normalise people’s preparedness behaviour, and to
connect it with an unequivocal understanding of the benefits of such changes.
Enhancing people's adaptive responses will help to avoid, or at least minimise,
associated human trauma and tragedy. That is the aim of this research.
Achieving positive, adaptive change requires proactive medium to longer term public
policy planning and implementation of strategies leading to considered, appropriate
response choices and desired protective behaviour as social norms. Demands upon
individuals, families, communities and workplaces are high in the complexity of 21st
century life: adapting to narrow the bushfire (or other natural hazard) awareness-preparedness gap – to become fire-fit – requires a re-ordering of priorities so that
fire-fitness becomes a societal-wide, integrated routine – as routine as buying
groceries or fuelling a car.
This predominantly pragmatic qualitative research used the socio-cognitive
Protection Motivation Theory (described by Rogers in 1975) in the context of
bushfire natural hazards with the ultimate aim of reducing human morbidity and
mortality, and concurrently promoting positive physical and psychological capacity.
The study considered data across and within two demographic groups – emergency
responders and the owners of any kind and any number of animals. It sought to 1. determine and discover how casualties to life, property and the environment,
including the physical and psychological health of people, their microclimates
and livelihoods, can be reduced and minimised while building a culture of
preparedness as an integral part of daily life, and 2. help negate wider perceptions of preparedness as a difficult, time-consuming task which although on nearly everyone’s ‘to do’ list is frequently not prioritised.
The major qualitative phase (phase 1) was followed by a minor quantitative phase
(phase 2) in the form of a pilot survey (discussed in Chapter 7) that investigated
farmers’ bushfire experiences and management strategies. The pilot survey was
conducted with a view to determining topics requiring further research, as well as
identifying knowledge and learning translatable to novice landowners.
This thesis is presented as a series of six papers – four published (P1-P4), two
submitted (SP1, SP2). Each paper addresses particular research questions, noted in
the box at the beginning of each chapter, and each published paper is followed by a
connecting narrative designed to convey the momentum, flow and logic of the
research progression.
The order of the papers presented in the thesis follows the chronology of the
research. Paper 1 critically explores the literature and investigates Protection
Motivation Theory (PMT) as a framework. Paper 2 provides an overview of the
qualitative data and identifies the focus for the next stage of analysis. Paper 3
discusses public policy and leads in to Paper 4 which proposes a number of
innovative and practical strategies to help improve fire-fitness for individuals and
across communities. The following two papers supplement and complement the four
published papers. SP1 contains more detail concerning public policy initiatives. SP2
is essentially P1 in practice and demonstrates how PMT can be usefully applied to
achieve the aim of the research - to reduce human morbidity and mortality in natural
hazard events. Thus, the reader is encouraged to read SP1 following P3, and SP2
following P4. Readers’ attention is drawn particularly to the Results, Interpretative
Analysis and Discussion sections in SP1 and SP2, where additional information on
policy and how PMT was expanded and applied may be found. Journal selection for the published papers was actively – and flexibly - considered
from the beginning of the project with the selection of suitable journals narrowing as
the focus of the research itself became more specific. Table 1, Journal selection and
chronology of publication, details this process. The research results indicate desired outcomes are indeed achievable by engaging a bold, innovative willingness to move beyond standard conservatism in the sector, and demonstrating a commitment to trial and evaluate recommendations. The wellbeing and safety of people in natural hazards is increasingly a public health issue.
This thesis proposes proactive initiatives that affirmatively and assertively respond to
meeting the parallel escalation of the inherent danger of natural hazards in a
changing climate without alienating public sentiment. It also identifies the need for
further research to fill a gaping omission in the literature regarding cropland fires -
with respect to crop types and placement, how different crops ‘carry’ a fire, and if
firebreaks can be better utilised as a fire management tool.
A summary of the strategies developed from the results of this research is presented
in Table 4, Strategies to help achieve fire-fitness. These are described in more detail
in papers P3, P4, SP1 and SP2.
In reconstructing the ‘costs’ and ‘rewards’ described in an expanded Protection
Motivation Theory to favour an overall net gain, and by providing ways to establish
fire-fitness as a desirable and attainable social norm, this research makes a practical
and timely contribution to future public policy decision-making in the global ‘new
reality’ of natural hazards
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