Shared Use of Intimate Technology: A Large-Scale Qualitative Study on the Use of Natural Cycles as a Digital ContraceptiveWe present a large-scale, qualitative interview study that examines how an intimate technology within reproductive health comes to be chosen and trusted as a mode of contraception and how its use is shared between partners. We conducted 133 semi-structured interviews with \textit{primary users} of Natural Cycles, focusing specifically on its use as \textit{a digital contraceptive}. Our interpretive analysis, first, sheds light on perceptions of risks and benefits, along with how, and by whom, the decision to adopt Natural Cycles got made. Second, we discuss participants' and their partners' gradual development of trust in the system, and how this intertwines with interpersonal trust. Third, we consider the shared use of Natural Cycles, including partner involvement in temperature tracking, the sharing of intimate data, and navigating specific choices and risks regarding sex and contraception. We make a primarily empirical contribution to Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) research on shared uses of technology and the sharing of intimate data, and highlight avenues for future work to foster understanding of intimate technologies and their shared use in relational settings.2025ALAiri Lampinen et al.Women & GenderCSCW
The Collaborative Work of Stewardship in Waste Management in Multi-tenant Apartment BuildingsThis paper examines the collaborative work of residents, housing associations, and property owners, in a multi-apartment housing complex, to manage household waste. Framed within the feminist ecological perspective of digital environmental stewardship - that is, how diverse actors, motivations, and capacities producing care for the environment that can be digitally mediated - we unpack how the many actors involved work together to keep waste in place, maintain the local waste system, and call on `responsibility' as a means to produce sustainable actions and accountability. We frame these practices of waste management within the mundane work of sociotechnical innovation. Borrowing from Jackson's notion of repair work, we weave together an argument for the novel and valuable contribution to sustainability research of CSCW approaches grounded in the everyday contingent emergencies of environmental care. We argue for approaches to sustainability that reflect the work to maintain sustainability ––not just produce it-- and the `good enough', a locally and reflexively produced equilibrium between maintenance and repair, which can frame the design of sociotechnical interventions mediating practices of waste management.2025CRChiara Rossitto et al.Infrastructure StudiesCSCW
StreetViewAI: Making Street View Accessible Using Context-Aware Multimodal AIInteractive streetscape mapping tools such as Google Street View (GSV) and Meta Mapillary enable users to virtually navigate and experience real-world environments via immersive 360° imagery but remain fundamentally inaccessible to blind users. We introduce StreetViewAI, the first-ever accessible street view tool, which combines context-aware, multimodal AI, accessible navigation controls, and conversational speech. With StreetViewAI, blind users can virtually examine destinations, engage in open-world exploration, or virtually tour any of the over 220 billion images and 100+ countries where GSV is deployed. We iteratively designed StreetViewAI with a mixed-visual ability team and performed an evaluation with eleven blind users. Our findings demonstrate the value of an accessible street view in supporting POI investigations and remote route planning. We close by enumerating key guidelines for future work.2025JFJon E. Froehlich et al.Visual Impairment Technologies (Screen Readers, Tactile Graphics, Braille)Interactive Data VisualizationGeospatial & Map VisualizationUIST
Designing for Secondary Users of Intimate TechnologiesDigital contraceptives are intimate technologies that support their users, and their partners, in preventing pregnancy. These technologies rely on basal body temperature data to predict ovulation and calculate a fertile window, where there is a risk of pregnancy if partners have unprotected sex. Although their use is shared and relational, these technologies are mainly designed for a primary user — the person who can become pregnant. We turn our attention to secondary users of digital contraception (i.e., sexual partners), specifically, Natural Cycles. We investigate how secondary users are designed for and how primary users imagine them to be. We contribute empirical insights on how secondary users are and are not involved in digital contraception and conclude with three design proposals describing how digital contraception tools could be designed to involve secondary users. We discuss how designing for secondary users of intimate technologies requires balancing their potential as co-users and adversaries.2025AOAlejandra Gómez Ortega et al.Reproductive & Women's HealthEmpowerment of Marginalized GroupsDIS
Let’s Talk Menopause: Promoting Intergenerational Dialogue about Menopause through DesignMenopause is an important life transition characterised by physiological, emotional, and social changes. It is surrounded by stigma and taboo. Thus, conversations about menopause are often rare, even among family members, and people often don’t know what to expect from menopause. We leverage design and collaborative making to promote (intergenerational) communication about menopause, between mothers and daughters, and between members of a broader audience. We describe a collaborative Research through Design process where we collaborated with six mother-daughter dyads to create material representations capturing and describing their diverse menopause experiences. Iterating on these representations, we designed and exhibited 5 interactive artifacts at Dutch Design Week 2024. We contribute with empirical findings on plural experiences around menopause, present the five artifacts built upon these experiences, and discuss the importance of pluralizing narratives around menopause through design.2025DODaisy O'Neill et al.Empowerment of Marginalized GroupsDesign FictionDIS
Making Intimate Technologies TogetherFeminist research highlights the urgent need to challenge the oppressive design of commercial intimate technologies, particularly how the FemTech industry restricts access to intimate bodily knowledge through paywalls and proprietary systems. Yet, for decades, women and marginalized communities have turned to Do-It-Yourself (DIY) or 'hacking' practices to reclaim control over their own gynecology and intimate health, addressing gaps often ignored by medical research and healthcare. Inspired by visual themes from these movements, this pictorial critically explores how designers and HCI researchers might advance DIY approaches to intimate technologies. We exemplify this with reflections from a series of workshops on handmade intimate sensors, and draw out the joyful potential of collaborative making—building alliances, destigmatizing intimate health, and using craft to subvert gender stereotypes. We discuss matters of safety when making together and contribute to ongoing work on building feminist makerspaces.2025NWNadia Campo Woytuk et al.LGBTQ+ Community Technology DesignParticipatory DesignFood Culture & Food InteractionDIS
Yarn as a Means to Give Form to Entanglements of Regulation, Design and Sustainability PracticesWhen designing with and for complex sustainability processes like waste management, it is crucial to understand digital technologies as entangled with broader systemic factors, including physical infrastructures and regulatory instruments. Within the specific case of organic household waste management, this pictorial aims at making such relations visible through design methods. We have used yarn to represent the different threads of these entanglements and defined specific configurations: tangles, knots, loose ends, and frayed threads. We discuss how the design practice of giving form to these entanglements can make complex relations between digital technology, infrastructures, and regulatory instruments more visible and actionable for HCI, and explore how digital technologies are – and can be – made to work within them.2025ARAnton Poikolainen Rosén et al.Sustainable HCIEcological Design & Green ComputingDIS
The Body as Its Own Best Sensor - An Autoethnographic Study of the Sensitivities of the Body in Long-Distance RunningLong-distance running is introduced as an example of a sport-specific somatic and embodied data practice that may expand the repertoire of techniques and methods of embodied interaction design and provide insights into the design of technologies for running specifically and sports technology more broadly. Through an autobiographic study of everyday experiences of running and the use of a basic sports watch, a number of themes revolving around the multi-sensoriality of running are introduced. Reflections on the intimate coupling of digital data, running skills, and somatic sensing in the practice of 'doing endurance running' are provided in order to conceptualise the specific sensitivities, perceptions and experiences of body-data-environment entanglements that emerge during long-distance running. By unpacking a number of such sports-specific skills and data practices involved in long-distance running, six themes for novel perspectives on the design of sports technology are discussed.2025JTJakob TholanderStockholm UniversityHuman Pose & Activity RecognitionFitness Tracking & Physical Activity MonitoringBiosensors & Physiological MonitoringCHI
I-Card: A Generative AI-Supported Intelligent Design Method Card DeckA design method card deck helps designers understand and provoke thinking by presenting each method in a simple format and allow designers to switch between methods seamlessly by maintaining the same simple format across the deck. However, recent observations have shown designers hesitate to use a card deck due to the lack of support, while other tools have provided identified support with generative AI. Through a formative study, we identified the specific support designers need when applying the design method cards and intentions in integrating generative AI. Accordingly, we developed the intelligent design method card deck, I-Card, which integrates generative AI to provide applicable design methods, design knowledge and data support, and interactive and dynamic support. A user study demonstrates that I-Card improved the design efficiency and applicability by offering personalized guidance, enhanced decision-making with comprehensive data generation and provided more design inspiration via interactive support.2025LCLiuqing Chen et al.Zhejiang University, College of Computer Science and TechnologyGenerative AI (Text, Image, Music, Video)Prototyping & User TestingCHI
Unlocking the Power of Speech: Game-Based Accent and Oral Communication Training for Immigrant English Language Learners via Large Language ModelsWith the growing number of immigrants globally, language barriers have become a significant challenge, particularly for those entering English-speaking countries. Traditional language learning methods often fail to provide sufficient practical opportunities, especially for diverse accents. To address this, we introduce Language Urban Odyssey (LUO), a serious game that leverages large language models (LLMs) and game-based learning to offer a low-cost, accessible virtual environment for English learners. Built on the Minecraft platform, LUO offers real-time speech interaction with NPCs of various accents, supported by multi-modal feedback. A controlled study (N=30) showed improvements in speaking abilities, accent comprehension, and emotional confidence. Our findings suggest that LUO provides a scalable, immersive platform that bridges gaps in language learning for immigrants facing cultural and social challenges.2025YZYijun Zhao et al.Zhejiang University; Hangzhou Chuanhe Machinery Co., Ltd.Conversational ChatbotsHuman-LLM CollaborationSerious & Functional GamesCHI
Friction in Processual Ethics: Reconfiguring Ethical Relations in Interdisciplinary ResearchFriction -- disagreement and breakdown -- is an omnipresent aspect of conducting interdisciplinary research yet is rarely presented in formal research reporting. We analyse a performance-led research process where professional dancers with different disabilities explored how to improvise with an industrial robot, with the support of an interdisciplinary team of human-computer and human-robot interaction researchers. We focus on one site of friction in our research process; how to dance -- safely -- with robots? By presenting our research process, we exemplify the different ways in which we encountered this friction and how we reconfigured the research process around it. We contribute five ways in which we arrived at a generative ethical outcome, which may be helpful in productively engaging with friction in interdisciplinary collaboration.2025RGRachael Garrett et al.KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Media Technology and Interaction DesignHuman-Robot Collaboration (HRC)Technology Ethics & Critical HCIDance & Body Movement ComputingCHI
CharacterCritique: Supporting Children's Development of Critical Thinking through Multi-Agent Interaction in Story ReadingCritical thinking plays a crucial role in children's education for fostering cognitive development, cultivating independent thinking habits, and enhancing their ability to problem-solving. However, the current educational model places greater emphasis on children's understanding of factual knowledge, with relatively less focus on developing critical thinking skills. We present CharacterCritique to support children's critical thinking based on the theory of inquiry dialogue. This tool uses an analytical story as the medium, it encourages dialogue between parents, children, and story characters. Through this process, children continuously engage in interpretation, analysis, explanation, evaluation, and regulation, all of which promote critical thinking and decision-making. Such interaction is supported by multiple agents. In our between-subjects study (n=32), we compared CharacterCritique to traditional storybook reading. The results show that CharacterCritique is more effective at sparking children's interest in deeper discussions. It also better fosters critical thinking, problem-solving skills, and creates more opportunities for parent-child dialogue.2025ZWZizhen Wang et al.Zhejiang UniversityCollaborative Learning & Peer TeachingSTEM Education & Science CommunicationCHI
In the Moment of Glitch: Engaging with Misalignments in Ethical PracticeGlitches -- moments when technologies do not work as desired -- will become increasingly common as industrially-designed robots move into complex contexts. Taking glitches to be potential sites of critical ethical reflection, we examine a glitch that occurred in the context of a collaborative research project where professional dancers with different disabilities improvised with a robotic arm. Through a first-person account, we analyse how the dancer, the robot, and the rest of the research team enacted ethics in the moment of glitch. Through this analysis, we discovered a deep and implicit ethical misalignment wherein our enactments of ethics in response to the glitch did not align with the values of the project. This prompted a critical re-engagement with our research process through which we forged a dialogue between different ethical perspectives that acted as an invitation to bring us back into ethical alignment with the project's values.2025RGRachael Garrett et al.KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Media Technology and Interaction DesignTechnology Ethics & Critical HCIParticipatory DesignDance & Body Movement ComputingCHI
Who Should Act? Distancing and Vulnerability in Technology Practitioners' Accounts of Ethical ResponsibilityAttending to emotion can shed light on why recognizing an ethical issue and taking responsibility for it can be so demanding. To examine emotions related to taking or not taking responsibility for ethical action, we conducted a semi-structured interview study with 23 individuals working in interaction design and developing AI systems in Scandinavian countries. Through a thematic analysis of how participants attribute ethical responsibility, we identify three ethical stances, that is, discursive approaches to answering the question ‘who should act’: an individualized I-stance (“the responsibility is mine”), a collective we-stance (“the responsibility is ours”), and a distanced they-stance (“the responsibility is someone else’s”). Further, we introduce the concepts of distancing and vulnerability to analyze the emotion work that these three ethical stances place on technology practitioners in situations of low- and high-scale technology development, where they have more or less control over the outcomes of their work. We show how the we- and they-stances let technology practitioners distance themselves from the results of their activity, while the I-stance makes them more vulnerable to emotional and material risks. By illustrating the emotional dimensions involved in recognizing ethical issues and embracing responsibility, our study contributes to the field of Ethics in Practice. We argue that emotions play a pivotal role in technology practitioners’ decision-making process, influencing their choices to either take action or refrain from doing so.2024KPKristina Popova et al.Session 4e: Navigating AI Ethical ChallengesCSCW
Honkable Gestalts: Why Autonomous Vehicles Get Honked AtThis paper analyzes honks directed at autonomous vehicles (AVs) by other drivers. As honks often mark problems, this focus allows us to better understand the challenges that AVs face in real traffic. Performing a sequential video analysis of 63 honk incidents uploaded by Tesla beta testers on YouTube, we identify how problematic situations emerge as honkable Traffic Gestalts. We identify four types of situated problems with AV driving performance marked by other drivers’ honks: they may wait too long, steer inconsistently, stop instead of going, and go too fast. We further show how a honk may be understandable as a warning, a nudge or a reprimand. Our work suggests designing honks for AVs to focus on relevant contexts, supported by developing bidirectional interfaces and audio analysis methods that consider the interplay of auditory and visual information in traffic.2024SPSergio Passero et al.Automated Driving Interface & Takeover DesignV2X (Vehicle-to-Everything) Communication DesignAutoUI
How to Train Your Drone - Exploring the Umwelt as a Design Metaphor for Human-drone InteractionHow To Train Your Drone is a novel human-drone interaction that demonstrates the generative potential of a design metaphor: the umwelt. We describe the concept of the umwelt and detail how we applied it to inform our soma design process, creating an interactive space where somatic understandings between human and drone could emerge. The system was deployed for a month into a shared household. We describe how three people explored and shaped the umwelts of their drones, leading to unique and intimate human-drone couplings. We discuss the compatibility of the umwelt to soma design practice and identify future avenues for research inspired by artificial life and evolutionary robotics. As our contribution, we illustrate how the umwelt as a design metaphor, can open up a generative new design space for human-drone interaction.2024JDJoseph La Delfa et al.Drone Interaction & ControlHuman-Nature Relationships (More-than-Human Design)DIS
Articulating Mechanical Sympathy for Somaesthetic Human-Machine RelationsWe present mechanical sympathy as a generative design concept for cultivating somaesthetic relationships with machines and machine-like systems. We identify the qualities of mechanical sympathy using the design case of How to Train your Drone, a unique human-drone research product designed to explore the process by which people discover and co-create the somaesthetic potential of drones. We articulate the qualities -- (i) machine-agency, (ii) oscillations, and (iii) aesthetic pursuits -- by using descriptive and reflective accounts of our design strategies and of our co-creators engaging with the system. We also discuss how each quality can extend soma design research; conceptualizing of appreciative, temporal, and idiosyncratic relationships with machines that can complement technical learning and enrich human-machine interaction. Finally, we ground our concept in a similar selection of works from across the HCI community.2024JDJoseph La Delfa et al.Full-Body Interaction & Embodied InputDrone Interaction & ControlHuman-Nature Relationships (More-than-Human Design)DIS
Shaping and Being Shaped by Drones: Programming in Perception-Action LoopsIn a long-term commitment to designing for the aesthetics of human–drone interactions, we have been troubled by the lack of tools for shaping and interactively feeling drone behaviours. By observing participants in a three-day drone challenge, we isolated components of drones that, if made transparent, could have helped participants better explore their aesthetic potential. Through a bricolage approach to analysing interviews, field notes, video recordings, and inspection of each team’s code, we describe how teams 1) shifted their efforts from aiming for seamless human–drone interaction, to seeing drones as fragile, wilful, and prone to crashes; 2) engaged with intimate, bodily interactions to more precisely probe, understand and define their drone’s capabilities; 3) adopted different workaround strategies, emphasising either training the drone or the pilot. We contribute an empirical account of constraints in shaping the potential aesthetics of drone behaviour, and discuss how programming environments could better support somaesthetic perception–action loops for design and programming purposes.2024MSMousa Sondoqah et al.Shape-Changing Interfaces & Soft Robotic MaterialsDrone Interaction & ControlDance & Body Movement ComputingDIS
Bodywork at Work: Attending to Bodily Needs in Gig, Shift, and Knowledge WorkThe concept of `bodywork´ refers to the work individuals undertake on their own bodies and the bodies of others. One aspect is attending to bodily needs, which is often overlooked in the workplace and HCI/CSCW research on work practices. Yet, this labour can be a significant barrier to work, consequential to work, and prone to spill over into other aspects of life. We present three empirical cases of bodywork: gig-based food delivery, shift work in hospitals and bars, and office-based knowledge work. We describe what attending to bodily needs at work entails and illustrate tactics employed so that work can be carried on, even when the body (or technology optimising it) breaks down. Arguing that all systems are bodily systems, we conclude with a call to acknowledge the centrality of bodies in all work and the roles technologies can play in supporting or constraining bodywork differently for different workers.2024DYDeepika Yadav et al.Stockholm UniversityWorkplace Wellbeing & Work StressImpact of Automation on WorkCHI
Cooking With Agents: Designing Context-aware Voice InteractionVoice Agents (VAs) are touted as being able to help users in complex tasks such as cooking and interacting as a conversational partner to provide information and advice while the task is ongoing. Through conversation analysis of 7 cooking sessions with a commercial VA, we identify challenges caused by a lack of contextual awareness leading to irrelevant responses, misinterpretation of requests, and information overload. Informed by this, we evaluated 16 cooking sessions with a wizard-led context-aware VA. We observed more fluent interaction between humans and agents, including more complex requests, explicit grounding within utterances, and complex social responses. We discuss reasons for this, the potential for personalisation, and the division of labour in VA communication and proactivity. Then, we discuss the recent advances in generative models and the VAs interaction challenges. We propose limited context awareness in VAs as a step toward explainable, explorable conversational interfaces.2024RJRazan Jaber et al.Stockholm University , Stockholm UniversityVoice User Interface (VUI) DesignContext-Aware ComputingCHI