'She's Just My Life': Digital Design to Support Women's Self-Other Care in Relationships with their Mothers

Title of the Paper

She’s Just My Life: Digital Design to Support Women’s Self-Other Care in Relationships with their Mothers

Paper Information

• Field of Study: Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), Technology and Care, Gender Studies
• Keywords: Digital care, family relationships, health and well-being, gender, women’s health, ethics of care, family technology design, intergenerational relationships

Research Background and Problem

• Issues and Challenges: Current digital care research often focuses on individualized models rather than considering the family as a unit of care and support. Additionally, there is limited research on how factors such as gender and class influence everyday caregiving relationships within families.
• Significance: Women, particularly in adulthood, often take on evolving caregiving responsibilities in their relationships with their mothers, which can have profound impacts on the health and well-being of both parties.
• Research Motivation and Related Work:
  • Recent HCI research on women’s health has been working to move beyond male-centered design perspectives, addressing women’s unique health needs.
  • However, existing studies on the emotional and caregiving dynamics between mothers and daughters, especially those arising from aging and role reversals, remain superficial.
  • Current family health technology research has yet to adequately demonstrate how appropriate design can support these complex relational dynamics.

Solution

• Proposed Approach:
  1. Conduct interview studies to explore women’s experiences of caregiving and self-well-being in their relationships with their mothers.
  2. Propose six design concepts aimed at supporting caregiving and communication within families through digital products.
• Innovative Aspects:
  • Investigating “mother-daughter relationships” as a unique perspective for digital technology to support intimate, informal caregiving.
  • Employing experience-driven design methods to integrate family care with gendered experiences in daily interactions.
• Implementation Steps:
  1. Data Collection and Analysis: Conduct in-depth interviews with six women from Ireland to study their caregiving practices for their mothers and their perspectives on their own well-being.
  2. Concept Design: Based on data analysis, develop six preliminary design concepts through brainstorming and speculative design.
  3. User Feedback and Evaluation: Engage participants in discussions about the design concepts and gather feedback to refine the design directions.

Research Outcomes

• Specific Findings:

  1. Identified four core themes:
     • Self-other caregiving behaviors
     • Blurred boundaries and identity formation
     • Relationship changes across the life cycle
     • Living spaces and conflicts
  2. Developed six digital prototypes, such as "IceBreaker," "Storm Glass," and "Answering Glass," aimed at addressing key tensions in mother-daughter relationships.
  3. Offered a series of recommendations for future research, including discussions on radical care technologies, designing for “independent spaces,” and anticipating relational tensions across the life cycle.

• Comparison with Existing Solutions and Advantages:

  • The proposed designs focus not only on caregiving goals (e.g., disease management) but also on fostering dialogue and reflection among family members through digital tools.
  • Compared to health monitoring products, these designs are more “gentle” and “contextualized,” better suited to women’s everyday caregiving relationships.

• Experiments and Evaluation:

  • User feedback indicated that the designed tools provided inspiration and practicality for everyday caregiving and communication.
  • However, concerns about privacy and technological complexity highlighted the need for careful ethical considerations in future product designs.

• Limitations and Future Directions:

  • The small sample size limits the generalizability of the findings.
  • Ethical and privacy concerns, such as asymmetrical monitoring technologies, could undermine the dignity of the care recipient.
  • Future research should include more diverse samples in terms of culture, class, and gender and extend the design to other types of intimate relationships (e.g., transgender or non-binary mother-daughter relationships).

This study provides an insightful framework for ethics of care and gender-oriented design in the HCI field, offering valuable theoretical and design guidance for the development of health and well-being technologies in the future.