Digital touch for remote personal communication: An emergent sociotechnical imaginary

This article makes legible emergent social imaginaries of digital touch for remote communication in personal relationships, with attention to digital touch interfaces. It draws on data from rapid prototyping research workshops with apprentice professionals embedded within digital communication. Touch is discussed with respect to four analytical themes: materiality, body, emplacement and temporality. We illustrate how participants’ past and present experiences and future visions of remote digital touch thread through these themes and weave together to form a hegemonic, emergent sociotechnical imaginary of digital touch. The article contributes to social debates within digital personal remote communication by foregrounding touch, the material and the sensorial. The article’s novel interdisciplinary framework (combining design-based rapid prototyping with a multimodal and multi-sensorial analysis within the frame of the sociotechnical imaginary) also contributes to methodology around future-facing phenomena, prior to the process of their solidification into material, political formations

Energy in the home: Everyday life and the effect on time of use

The application of building simulation and modelling is becoming more widespread, particularly in the analysis of residential buildings. The energy consumption and control of systems in residential buildings are tightly linked to the behaviour of people, arguably more so than in commercial buildings which have traditionally been the preserve of building simulation analysis. The input profiles used in simulation pay little attention to the link between numerical characterisations of observed ‘behaviour’ and the way people actually live in the home. Understanding this is important if we are to improve the modelling of buildings, gain greater insight into energy consumption and make better decisions about future energy production and generation. This paper explores this link by combining conventional numerical analysis of appliance data with insights from the ethnographic study of families in 20 UK homes. Ethnographic insights provide a context to the analysis and understanding of monitoring data that would not otherwise be possible. Importantly, this paper highlights the need to rethink previously static notions of simulation input, such as occupancy and individual appliance use

Hanging out at home: Laundry as a thread and texture of everyday life

Laundry, one of the most mundane but most fundamental everyday life activities, has received little attention in cultural studies of everyday life. In contrast it has attracted the analytical attention of sociologists of everyday practices and social relations, and energy and health researchers. Here we suggest that an approach which attends to theoretical turns towards phenomenology, spatiality and materiality can offer a new interpretation of the significance and implications of laundry in everyday life. Drawing on research in 20 UK households, we focus on the example of indoor laundry drying to interpret laundry through a theory of place and materiality. We suggest that such an approach offers new understandings of how home is made and has implications for how cultural studies research into everyday life might be engaged in applied research relating to climate change and the environment

Energy in the home: Everyday life and the effect on time of use

The application of building simulation and modelling is becoming more widespread, particularly in the analysis of residential buildings. The energy consumption and control of systems in residential buildings are tightly linked to the behaviour of people, arguably more so than in commercial buildings which have traditionally been the preserve of building simulation analysis. The input profiles used in simulation pay little attention to the link between numerical characterisations of observed 'behaviour' and the way people actually live in the home. Understanding this is important if we are to improve the modelling of buildings, gain greater insight into energy consumption and make better decisions about future energy production and generation. This paper explores this link by combining conventional numerical analysis of appliance data with insights from the ethnographic study of families in 20 UK homes. Ethnographic insights provide a context to the analysis and understanding of monitoring data that would not otherwise be possible. Importantly, this paper highlights the need to rethink previously static notions of simulation input, such as occupancy and individual appliance use. Copyright © 2011 by IPAC'11/EPS-AG

Applying the lens of sensory ethnography to sustainable HCI

Sociological appropriations of practice theory as applied to sustainable design have successfully problematized overly simplistic and individualistic models of consumer choice and behavior change. By taking everyday practices as the principal units of analysis, they move towards acknowledging the socially and materially structured nature of human activity. However, to inform sustainable HCI we also need to understand how practices are part of wider experiential environments and flows of practical activity. In this article, we develop an approach rooted in phenomenological anthropology and sensory ethnography. This approach builds on theories of place, perception and movement and enables us to situate practices, and understand practical activity, as emplaced within complex and shifting ecologies of things. Drawing on an interdisciplinary study of domestic energy consumption and digital media use, we discuss ethnographic and design practice examples. We demonstrate how this theoretical and methodological framework can be aligned with the 3rd paradigm of HCI

Secondary findings in inherited heart conditions: a genotype-first feasibility study to assess phenotype, behavioural and psychosocial outcomes

Disclosing secondary findings (SF) from genome sequencing (GS) can alert carriers to disease risk. However, evidence around variant-disease association and consequences of disclosure for individuals and healthcare services is limited. We report on the feasibility of an approach to identification of SF in inherited cardiac conditions (ICC) genes in participants in a rare disease GS study, followed by targeted clinical evaluation. Qualitative methods were used to explore behavioural and psychosocial consequences of disclosure. ICC genes were analysed in genome sequence data from 7203 research participants; a two-stage approach was used to recruit genotype-blind variant carriers and matched controls. Cardiac-focused medical and family history collection and genetic counselling were followed by standard clinical tests, blinded to genotype. Pathogenic ICC variants were identified in 0.61% of individuals; 20 were eligible for the present study. Four variant carriers and seven non-carrier controls participated. One variant carrier had a family history of ICC and was clinically affected; a second was clinically unaffected and had no relevant family history. One variant, in two unrelated participants, was subsequently reclassified as being of uncertain significance. Analysis of qualitative data highlights participant satisfaction with approach, willingness to follow clinical recommendations, but variable outcomes of relatives’ engagement with healthcare services. In conclusion, when offered access to SF, many people choose not to pursue them. For others, disclosure of ICC SF in a specialist setting is valued and of likely clinical utility, and can be expected to identify individuals with, and without a phenotype

Comparison of methods for determining key marine areas from tracking data

There is an urgent need to identify key marine areas for conservation, particularly in the high seas. A range of techniques have been applied to tracking data from higher predators, particularly seabirds and pinnipeds, to determine the areas of greatest use. This study compared three commonly used methods—kernel, first-passage time and state-space modelling—and a new approach, minimum displacement rate, for the analysis of data from the wandering albatross Diomedea exulans of Bird Island, South Georgia, tracked during the chick-rearing period. Applied to a single track, these four models identified similar marine areas as important. The greatest similarity in areas identified occurred when model assumptions were shared (such as slow speed indicating spatial preference) even when methods modelled these assumptions differently (e.g. Bayesian inference versus cumulative density surface). A gridded overlap approach applied to all tracks revealed core areas not apparent from results of any single analysis. The gridded approach also revealed spatial overlap between methods based on different assumptions (e.g. minimum displacement rate and kernel analysis) and between individuals. Although areas identified as important by kernel and first-passage time analysis of a single track were biased towards resting locations during darkness, this does not negate the requirement for their protection. Using the gridded overlap approach, two distinct core regions were identified for the wandering albatross; one close to the breeding colony and another 800 km to the North–West in the high seas. This convenient and pragmatic approach could be applied to large data sets and across species for the identification of a network of candidate marine protected areas in coastal and pelagic waters

Intestinal lymphatic vasculature: structure, mechanisms and functions.

The mammalian intestine is richly supplied with lymphatic vasculature, which has functions ranging from maintenance of interstitial fluid balance to transport of antigens, antigen-presenting cells, dietary lipids and fat-soluble vitamins. In this Review, we provide in-depth information concerning the organization and structure of intestinal lymphatics, the current view of their developmental origins, as well as molecular mechanisms of intestinal lymphatic patterning and maintenance. We will also discuss physiological aspects of intestinal lymph flow regulation and the known and emerging roles of intestinal lymphatic vessels in human diseases, such as IBD, infection and cancer