Motivating online engagement and debates on energy consumption

Several studies and official reports argue that changing people’s behavior towards energy consumption is a vital part of our fight against climate change. Engaging people into this issue is the first step towards a social change. However, it has been shown that information campaigns and technology alone are insufficient to achieve such engagement. Understanding what motivate people, in which contexts and combinations, and for which individuals, is therefore key to engaging the public more successfully in such crucial debates. This work investigates the role and impact of motivational strategies on promoting engagement in online energy debates. We report our results from running an experiment in the workplace, in which 33 people contributed to an online discussion on reducing energy consumption. A public and tangible feedback of contributions to the online debate, as well as social comparison and competition were analyzed as motivational strategies. Our results point out that engagement goes beyond intrinsic motivation, and that a set of interplaying factors influenced by the social context was found to be the stronger motivational force of engagement

Climate Change Engagement: Results of a Multi-Task Game with a Purpose

Addressing the challenge of engaging people with climate change, this paper sheds light on the Climate Challenge, a crowdsourcing application in the tradition of games with purpose that relies on different strategies for informing and inviting users to adopt sustainable lifestyle choices. Towards building an extensive perspective of engagement, we statistically analyse specific game strategies based on users’ participation and performance, and build a panorama of users’ positioning in a behaviour change process. Preliminary results suggest features that should be considered in a Climate Challenge design roadmap

Aspectos motivacionais no design de tecnologia para mudanças sociais

Orientador: Maria Cecília Calani BaranauskasTese (doutorado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de ComputaçãoResumo: Conectando pessoas e presente em todos os aspectos da vida, quando projetadas para este fim, as tecnologias têm potencial de influenciar a forma com que pessoas em um grupo social percebem e se relacionam com as coisas no ambiente. Este estudo de doutorado em Interação Humano-Computador (IHC) investiga como elementos motivacionais da Psicologia podem ser aplicados para informar o design, explo- rando esse potencial da tecnologia em promover mudanças sociais. O estudo é instanciado no domínio de consumo de energia elétrica, lidando com o desafio contemporâneo de cons- cientizar a sociedade dos limites naturais do planeta no que diz respeito ao uso de recursos naturais. Informar o design com aspectos motivacionais é uma abordagem recente em IHC. Quando encontrada na literatura, comumente tem foco em aspectos individuais e intrín- secos da motivação. Contudo, como argumentado nessa pesquisa, o contexto sociocultural evidencia a importância de considerar também os fatores externos que motivam as pessoas a se engajarem com uma tecnologia e com uma determinada questão social. Por considerar tanto fontes intrínsecas quanto extrínsecas de motivação, a Teoria da Autodeterminação é então considerada o principal referencial teórico da Psicologia nessa investigação, e a Semiótica Organizacional é a base metodológica para analisar os elemen- tos socioculturais que influenciam a motivação extrínseca. A análise situada dos dados socioculturais por uma perspectiva motivacional levou ao design da Tecnologia Socialmente Informada para Eco-Feedback de Energia (sigla SEET, em inglês), uma arquitetura que tem por objetivo estabelecer um novo padrão de com- portamento, ou uma nova maneira de perceber o consumo de energia coletivamente. O SEET é composto por um sistema interativo que promove colaboração, e pela Árvore da Energia, um dispositivo de feedback tangível para locais onde há encontro de pessoas. O SEET é avaliado em dois cenários complementares: uma Escola de Ensino Funda- mental no Brasil, onde os dados socioculturais foram coletados, analisados e aplicados para informar o design; e no contexto de um departamento de uma universidade no Reino Unido. Aspectos motivacionais da arquitetura do SEET são então analisadas, assim como o impacto dessa tecnologia ao desencadear as esperadas mudanças sociaisAbstract: By connecting people and being present in almost all aspects of life, when properly de- signed for that, technology can potentially influence the way people in a social group perceive and relate with things in their environment. This PhD study in the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) field investigates how motivational elements from Psychology can be applied to inform the design aiming at exploring this potential of technology for promoting a social change. The study is in- stantiated in the energy consumption domain, coping with the contemporary challenge of raising awareness among the society of the planet¿s natural resources usage and limits. Informing the design with motivational aspects is a recent approach in HCI. When found in literature, it is mostly focused on individual and intrinsic aspects of motivation. However, as argued in this research, the sociocultural context evidences the importance of considering also the external factors that motivate people to be engaged with technology and the social issue. By taking into account both intrinsic and extrinsic sources of motivation, the Self- Determination Theory is then considered the main theoretical background from Psychol- ogy in this investigation, and the Organisational Semiotics the methodological basis to analyse sociocultural elements that influence extrinsic motivation. The situated analysis of sociocultural data with motivational lenses has led to the de- sign of a Socially-informed Energy Eco-feedback Technology (SEET), an architecture that aims at establishing a "new pattern of behaviour", or a new way of perceiving collective energy consumption. The SEET is composed by an interactive system that promotes collaboration and The Energy Tree, a tangible and public feedback device for gathering places. The SEET is evaluated in two complementary scenarios: an elementary school in Brazil, where the sociocultural data was collected, analysed and applied to inform design; and in the context of an university department in the United Kingdom. Motivational as- pects of the SEET architecture are then analysed, as well as the impact of this technology to trigger the desired social changeDoutoradoCiência da ComputaçãoDoutora em Ciência da Computaçã

Shedding lights on human values: an approach to engage families with energy conservation

Changing behaviour related to energy conservation is not an emotionally neutral task. People have to deal with individual and group interests, contextual constraints, eventually trading-off between their values and effective actions in terms of savings. This paper presents a set of dynamics and artefacts for families to raise and share their energy awareness, and transform it into sustainable behaviour. This method based on human values was applied with 7 families to identify critical factors that must be in play when promoting energy conservation within a social group. Preliminary results confirmed that bringing families’ values into discussion and establishing shared commitments and responsibilities are promising approaches for technology design with the purpose to raise awareness collectively and promote effective changes in behaviour towards protecting the natural environment

Perceptions and behaviour towards climate change and energy savings: the role of social media

Success in promoting changes in behaviour is often dependent on the choice of interventions. This research investigates the use of social technology features as interventions to raise energy awareness and to promote a collective behaviour change towards saving energy. Aiming at understanding this scenario, an online survey was conducted to extract from Internet users their current position towards climate change, energy savings, and social media usage. Main results are reported in this paper indicating, for instance, that social media is not yet a main source of information in this context. Triggering discussions around the consumption of specific appliances, and associating it with energy-saving tips based on personal experiences were pointed out as promising approaches to support behaviour change through social media

Collective intelligence for promoting changes in behaviour: a case study on energy conservation

Climate change is one of the biggest challenges humanity faces today. Despite of high investments in technology, battling climate change is futile without the participation of the public, and changing their perception and habits. Collective intelligence tools can play an important role in translating this “distant” concept that is climate change into practical hints for everyday life. In this paper, we report a case study grounded on collective intelligence tools to collaboratively build knowledge around energy conservation. A preliminary study to raise energy awareness in an academic environment is summarised, setting the scene to a more ambitious initiative based on personal stories to transform energy awareness into behaviour change. The role of the collective intelligence tools and other technical artefacts involved are discussed, suggesting strategies and features that contributed (or not) to users’ engagement and collective awareness. Lessons learned from both studies are reported with a sociotechnical approach as implications for design pursuing behaviour change

The Cleantech Company

A Internet tem sido um meio ao serviço do marketing, uma vez que constitui um espaço onde está conectada uma ampla e extensa audiência. Desta forma o marketing digital tem vindo a utilizar instrumentos que permitem manter uma relação contínua entre empresas e os seus clientes, tendo o marketing direto evoluído para a aplicação de conceitos e técnicas mais próximos do marketing de relacionamento ou CRM (Customer Relationship Management). As tendências que temos sentido ao nível do comportamento de compra do consumidor, têm colocado o poder de ação mais centrado nele próprio, pelo que temos verificado através da segmentação online que é o cliente que determina a que segmento pertence. O Inbound Marketing tem vindo a captar a atenção dos marketeers, uma vez que apresenta uma nova visão que se baseia em captar o interesse das pessoas e fazer com que os potenciais clientes procurem e encontrem as empresas. Temos igualmente sentido novos comportamentos que têm sido moldados pelas novas tecnologias e que nos têm tornado mais abertos para o mundo e mais colaborativos. Daí têm surgido plataformas de colaboração virtual que procuram conectar vários especialistas no mundo, no sentido de cocriarem soluções que sejam benéficas e resolvam desafios ambientais, sociais e económicos, como é o caso, da Solved – The Cleantech Company, empresa sediada na Finlândia e que tem uma filial na Eslováquia, Bratislava onde o estágio referente a este relatório foi efetuado. Durante o estágio foram denotados determinados constrangimentos que punham em causa a concretização do pleno potencial da empresa. Assim, foram ponderadas e trabalhadas as respetivas soluções, com a elaboração de um plano estratégico e de ação de marketing, tendo em conta a metodologia de Inbound Marketing. Espera-se com isto obter os seguintes resultados: inversão do processo de angariação de clientes; captação de novos leads com a otimização do website e blog; departamentos de marketing e vendas integrados na estratégia de Inbound Marketing; expansão da visibilidade da marca e comunidade Solved; certificação online e preparação de potenciais clientes e especialistas da comunidade como gestores e coordenadores de projeto virtual.The Internet has been a way to serve marketing since it is a space where a wide and extensive audience is connected. In this way digital marketing has been using tools that allow us to maintain a continuous relationship between companies and their customers, having direct marketing evolved to apply concepts and techniques closer to relationship marketing or CRM (Customer Relationship Management). The trends that we have felt at the level of consumer buying behavior have put the power of action more centered on itself, so we have verified through the online segmentation that is the customer that determines which segment belongs. Inbound Marketing has been catching the attention of marketeers since it presents a new vision based on capturing people's interest and getting potential customers searching and finding the companies. New behaviors have been shaped by new technologies and have made us more open to the world and more collaborative. This has led to the emergence of virtual collaboration platforms that seek to connect several experts around the world to co-create solutions that are beneficial and solve environmental, social and economic challenges, such as Solved - The Cleantech Company, a company based in Finland that has a branch in Slovakia, Bratislava where the internship related to this report took place. During the internship, some factors were strangling the full potential of the company's. Thus, solutions were considered and worked out, with the elaboration of a strategic plan and marketing action, taking into account the methodology of Inbound Marketing, from which it is expected that their application will lead to the following results: customer acquisition, customer start to look for the company; capturing new leads with website and blog optimization; marketing and sales departments integrated into the strategy of Inbound Marketing; expanding the visibility of the Solved brand and community, and online certification and preparation of potential clients and community experts as virtual project managers and coordinators

Can environmental citizenship be enhanced through social media? A case study of engagement in a UK University

The research presented in this thesis focuses around the question: “can social media tools be used effectively to foster a participatory process that increases environmental citizenship and promote pro-environmental behaviour-change?”. The research aims to understand the role of staff and students in the socio-technical system that influences an institution’s environmental impact. Users need not to be educated, but empowered in order to be able to take decisions that would reduce the environmental impact of their institutions. Therefore a participatory process is suggested as the right tool to nurture environmental citizens, who will be able to take ‘right’ and ‘good’ decisions about their pro-environmental actions. In the last years, social media have emerged as a worldwide phenomenon. But alongside the grand claims of a social media inspired ‘revolution’ lie more nuanced questions around the role of digital tools in ‘every day’ contexts, and whether or not they are facilitating a cultural change or merely adding to the noise of modern life. The thesis contributes to the debate through presenting findings from an action research study at an East Midlands University in which a case study approach was implemented to explore the potentialities offered by participating in decision-making regarding pro-environmental issues in the institutional context, as they are mediated by social media. To generate behaviour-change the two correlated theories of public engagement and environmental citizenship were tested. Findings indicate that behaviour change and enhanced environmental citizenship are achievable through participation using social media, as several interviewees reported a change or a reinforcement of already existing pro-environmental behaviours as a consequence of the campaign. However, the reported changes were minor and it is difficult to advocate that they could noticeably contribute to the requested reduction targets on carbon emission from behaviour-change of the HE sector

Techniques d'interaction 'phygitales' pour l'exploration de systèmes informationnels complexes

Durant cette dernière décennie, la quantité de données numériques n'a cessé d'augmenter. Ces données provenant de l'Internet des Objets ou de smartphones permettent aux utilisateurs de comprendre et d'analyser leur santé, leur mode de vie ou encore leur consommation énergétique, et aux différentes institutions (villes, campus, promoteurs immobiliers) de gérer le flux de population, le trafic routier ou les pertes énergétiques dans les bâtiments administrés. Le domaine de la "ville intelligente" en tire particulièrement profit. Il est donc capital de mettre à disposition des visualisations interactives de ces données pour pouvoir faire émerger des connaissances et faciliter la prise de décision. Une approche récente propose de représenter ces données proches de l'objet qui les capte ou les produit. Cependant, ce domaine est encore assez récent et il reste de nombreux défis à explorer. Un des défis majeurs identifié par Thomas et collab. (Thomas et al., 2018) est le développement et la conception de techniques d'interaction pour faciliter l'analyse de données situées. L'objectif de nos travaux de thèse est de concevoir et d'évaluer des solutions interactives tirant profit du référent physique pour interagir avec des données numériques situées en se focalisant sur une tâche interactive fondamentale en IHM : la sélection. Dans ce manuscrit nous abordons cette tâche selon une approche fonctionnelle et une approche conceptuelle.Over the past decade, the amount of digital data has been increasing. This data from the Internet of Things or smartphones allows users to understand and analyse their health, lifestyle or energy consumption, and different institutions (cities, campuses, real estate developers) to manage the flow of people, road traffic or energy losses in the buildings they manage. One particular topic that benefits from this is the "smart city". It is therefore essential to make interactive visualisations of this data available in order to generate knowledge and facilitate decision-making. A recent approach proposes to represent these data close to the object that captures or produces them. However, this field is still quite new and there are still many challenges to explore. One of the major challenges identified by Thomas et al. (Thomas et al., 2018) is the development and design of interaction techniques to facilitate the analysis of situated data. The objective of our thesis work is to design and evaluate interactive solutions leveraging the physical referent to interact with situated digital data by focusing on a fundamental interactive task in HCI: selection. In this manuscript we study this task from both a practical and a conceptual approach