A Shikake as an Embodied Trigger for Behavior Change

Abstract A shikake is an embodied trigger for behavior change to solve social or personal issues. In this paper, we give a general statement regarding the concept of Shikakeology as the science of shikake. The mechanism behind a shikake covers a wide range of physical and psychological triggers. From a shikake point of view, physical triggers are used to ignite psychological triggers, and psychological triggers work as a driving force for changing behavior. We will describe four simple shikake cases to explain the concept of shikake as well as the mechanisms of triggers. We choose to use case studies to make readers understand the mechanism of shikake as a starting point. We also present the idea of a Shikakeology ecosystem, which is a feedback loop between citizen science, academia, and education

Three dimensions of design for sustainable behaviour

Designing products to be more sustainable is crucial if the UK is to meet the challenge of its ambitious new carbon reductions targets by 2050. How designers, manufacturers and service providers conceptualise behaviour is key to understanding how there will be widespread adoption of new products. The research area referred to as Design for Sustainable Behaviour has emerged to explore measures of reducing environmental impact through moderating the way people use products, services and systems. To date, though, characterisations of its strategies have been relatively one-dimensional, with an emphasis on environmental psychological approaches to understanding behaviour. This paper draws on a wider set of literature and academic disciplines to propose a conceptual framework that incorporates three dimensions: empowerment, information and motivation. This three-dimensional framework argues for a wider understanding of behaviour that encompasses feedback, participation and acknowledgement of the wider social and organisational context that behaviour is situated in. This framework is presented, the implications for theory and practice are explored, and a challenge is laid down to designers, academics and policymakers to consider how this framework can be applied, tested and further developed

Of Mice and Maidens: Ideologies of Interspecies Romance in Late Medieval and Early Modern Japan

Interspecies marriage (irui kon\u27in) has long been a central theme in Japanese literature and folklore. Frequently dismissed as fairytales, stories of interspecies marriage illuminate contemporaneous conceptions of the animal-human boundary and the anxieties surrounding it. This dissertation contributes to the emerging field of animal studies by examining otogizoshi (Muromachi/early Edo illustrated narrative fiction) concerning relationships between human women and male mice. The earliest of these is Nezumi no soshi ( The Tale of the Mouse ), a fifteenth century ko-e ( small scroll ) attributed to court painter Tosa Mitsunobu. Nezumi no soshi was followed roughly a century later by a group of tales collectively named after their protagonist, the mouse Gon no Kami. Unlike Nezumi no soshi, which focuses on the grief of the woman who has unwittingly married a mouse, the Gon no Kami tales contain pronounced comic elements and devote attention to the mouse-groom\u27s perspective. By elucidating the contrast between Nezumi no soshi and the earliest Gon no Kami manuscript and tracking the development of subsequent versions of Gon no Kami, I demonstrate mounting disenchantment with the irui kon\u27in trope as a means of telling stories about mice. Tales of interspecies marriage often end tragically; however, in fiction about mice, audience interest came to center on the utopian aspects of the imaginary mouse realm. Thus, mouse-human romance was displaced by storylines more conducive to happy endings, as in mid-seventeenth-century otogizoshi like Yahyoe nezumi ( The Mouse Yahyoe ) and Kakurezato ( The Hidden Village ), or slightly later kusazoshi (woodblock-print books) like Nezumi no yomeiri ( The Mouse\u27s Wedding ). The works above belong to a larger body of fiction about mice produced from the late Muromachi to mid-Edo. Previously, mice had received scant literary attention in irui kon\u27in tales and elsewhere. The sudden boom of mouse tales was driven by increased rodent-human contact due to urbanization, and also by the growing popularity of the god Daikokuten, whose iconography prominently featured mice. Mice were simultaneously reviled as vermin and celebrated as good omens, compelling the Gon no Kami stories and other mouse tales to negotiate between these contradictory identities