Lull: Designing Crip Pacing Technologies Energy limiting conditions (ELC), such as long COVID and ME/CFS, require the careful monitoring and pacing of activity and rest to avoid over-exertion. Commercially available fitness tracking technologies are currently being “misused” to manage these conditions. Based on co-design research with people with ELC, we conducted a research-through-design process to ideate upon what ELC pacing technologies could be. Our ongoing design process is informed by crip theories that highlight the social and political, rather than medical, aspects of disability and chronic conditions. In an attempt to offer non-medicalising pacing technologies, we explored integrating bronze casting as a jewelry making technique within the prototyping process. We also explore how we can present quantitative pacing data gathered from wearable sensors through felt vibrations on the body in a way that can be therapeutic and allow for the user to calibrate the quantitative data with their own felt sense of fatigue.2025SHSarah Homewood et al.Vibrotactile Feedback & Skin StimulationHaptic WearablesCognitive Impairment & Neurodiversity (Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia)DIS
Estrangement through SilenceHow can we cultivate deeper attunement to one another, ourselves, and the environment that can, in turn, inform and enrich design? Over the course of four workshops conducted across 1.5 years – primarily outdoors – the authors engaged in prolonged periods of shared silence. This collective silence functioned as an estrangement method, revealing the porous and interdependent boundaries between people and things, mutually constituting one another. We unpack some of the experiential qualities emerging from these experiments and mobilize them for future design processes, including: cultivating multifaceted sensibilities, dynamic modes of noticing and interacting, such as coming together and dispersing, being alone together, and acting or playing in unison; the malleability of silence to specific, orchestrated design activities, such as cooking or designing; and reframing silence, not as an absence, but as a presence – rich with sounds, interactions, and possibilities for engagement. We discuss how to set up temporal and spatial boundaries, alongside boundaries within and between ourselves.2025JFJonas Fritsch et al.Technology Ethics & Critical HCIHuman-Nature Relationships (More-than-Human Design)DIS
The Centers and Margins of Modeling Humans in Well-being TechnologiesThis paper critically examines the machine learning (ML) modeling of humans in three case studies of well-being technologies. Through a critical technical approach, it examines how these apps were experienced in daily life (technology in use) to surface breakdowns and to identify the assumptions about the “human” body entrenched in the ML models (technology design). To address these issues, this paper applies agential realism to decenter foundational assumptions, such as body regularity and health/illness binaries, and speculates more inclusive design and ML modeling paths that acknowledge irregularity, human-system entanglements, and uncertain transitions. This work is among the first to explore the implications of decentering theories in computational modeling of human bodies and well-being, offering insights for more inclusive technologies and speculations toward posthuman-centered ML modeling.2025JZJichen Zhu et al.IT University of CopenhagenCognitive Impairment & Neurodiversity (Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia)Mental Health Apps & Online Support CommunitiesTechnology Ethics & Critical HCICHI
"Ethics is not neutral": Understanding Ethical and Responsible AI Design from the Lenses of Black YouthThe rise of generative AI has brought a host of challenges for historically marginalized groups, including increased surveillance, AI-mediated racism, and algorithmic inequity. While stakeholders emphasize ethical and responsible AI that is safe, anti-discriminatory, and "protects human dignity", the centrality of anti-Blackness in the design, development, and deployment of AI systems coupled with race-evasive approaches to defining and advancing ethical, equitable, and ‘human-centered’ technologies have exacerbated racial oppression. We present three case studies of speculative technologies designed by Black youth in a college bridge, summer course that examine ethical and responsible AI in their everyday lives. From a bottom-up approach, we infringe upon this broader discourse to provide an initial grounding of responsible and ethical AI as well as discuss the criticality of Black, historically anchored, culturally-situated lenses to offer justice-oriented design principles that can guide the teaching, learning, and design of technology.2025TTTiera Tanksley et al.UCLAAI Ethics, Fairness & AccountabilityGender & Race Issues in HCIEmpowerment of Marginalized GroupsCHI
Fabulation as an Approach for Design FuturingEnvisioning alternative futures and desirable worlds is a core element of design that must be cultivated, especially when a deep transition of practices, values, and power is necessary for vibrant and just future lifeworlds. In this paper, we contribute towards fabulation as an approach for design futuring that foregrounds feminist commitments and more-than-human concerns. Analyzing two fabulation case studies around biodata and bodily fluids, we offer three themes based on our process of developing these fabulations: how they engage materials, how they work to trouble temporalities, and how they cultivate imagination. We argue for the emerging potential of fabulation as an approach for open-ended, joyful design futuring, mobilizing speculative storytelling to foreground absent or neglected relations when imagining alternative lifeworlds.2023MSMarie Louise Juul Søndergaard et al.Design FictionHuman-Nature Relationships (More-than-Human Design)DIS
Exploring Long-Term Mediated Relations with a Shape-Changing Thing: A Field Study of coMorphing StoolThis paper presents a long-term field study of the coMorphing stool: a computational thing that can change shape in response to the surrounding light. We deployed 5 coMorphing stools to 5 participants’ homes over 9 months. As co-speculators, the participants reflected on their mediated relations with the coMorphing stool. Findings suggest that they perceived the subtle transformations of the coMorphing stool in the early days of the deployment. After becoming familiar with these features, they interpreted their daily entanglements with the coMorphing stool in diverse personalized ways. Over time, the co-speculators accepted the coMorphing stool as part of their homes. These findings contribute new empirical insights to the shape-changing research field in HCI and enrich discussions on higher-level concepts in postphenomenology. Reflecting on these experiences promotes further HCI explorations on computational things.2023CZCe Zhong et al.Simon Fraser UniversityShape-Changing Interfaces & Soft Robotic MaterialsCHI
Caring for Intimate Data in Fertility TechnologiesFertility tracking applications are technologies that collect sensitive information about their users i.e. reproductive potential. For many, these apps are an affordable solution when trying to conceive or managing their pregnancy. However, intimate data are not only collected but also shared beyond users knowledge or consent. In this paper, we explore the privacy risks that can originate from the mismanagement, misuse, and misappropriation of intimate data, which are entwined in individual life events and in public health issues such as abortion and (in)fertility. We look at differential vulnerabilities to enquire data’s vulnerability and that of ‘data subjects’. We introduce the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and how it addresses fertility data. We evaluate the privacy of 30 top ‘fertility apps' through their privacy notices and tracking practices. Lastly, we discuss the regulations and fertility data as critical to the future design of tracking technologies and privacy rights.2021MMMaryam Mehrnezhad et al.Newcastle UniversityReproductive & Women's HealthPrivacy by Design & User ControlPrivacy Perception & Decision-MakingCHI
"My Library Has Just Been Obliterated": Producing New Norms of Use Via Software UpdateSoftware updates are commonly perceived as tools for fixing flaws and improving functionality. In this paper, we problematise this view by showing how software updates may also be used by vendors to create new norms of use that control user behaviour and reduce their agency. We explore the nature and aftermath of a controversial software update that was released by Spotify in June 2019. By analysing almost 3,500 reactions to this update, we show how it removed and modified several features in ways that severely affected users' capability to organise, navigate, and maintain their music libraries, while it pushed modes of listening that delegate song selection to Spotify. Elaborating upon our results, we discuss how updates may be used as political tools that privilege certain forms of behaviour while restricting others. We also portray updates as sites where ongoing struggles and negotiations regarding user agency and digital ownership take place.2020FMFabio Morreale et al.University of AucklandPrivacy by Design & User ControlContent Moderation & Platform GovernanceOnline Identity & Self-PresentationCHI
Designing and Evaluating Calmer, a Device for Simulating Maternal Skin-to-Skin Holding for Premature InfantsWe describe the design and deployment of Calmer, a technology that simulates key aspects of maternal skin-to-skin holding for prematurely born infants: its inspiration, approach, physical design, and introduction into the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Maternal skin-to-skin holding can mitigate neonatal pain during medical procedures by as much as 50%, which can improve weight gain, sleep and later development. However, parents cannot always be present, and some infants are too fragile to be held. Interventions targeting this gap could be perceived as supplanting the mother in this intimate role, exposing her to depression and endangering her maternal bond. Over 10 years, we iteratively developed Calmer and demonstrated infant health benefit in a randomized clinical trial. Here, we report and reflect on pursuing this goal in a socially and technologically complex context: constraints, strategies, features, reception of the device, and surprises, such as leading to mothers feeling channeled rather than replaced.2020SHSabrina Hauser et al.Umeå UniversitySurgical Assistance & Medical TrainingRobots in Education & HealthcareCHI
Technology and the givens of existence: Toward an existential inquiry framework in HCI researchThe profound impact of digital technologies on human life makes it imperative for HCI research to deal with the most fundamental aspects of human existence. Arguably, insights from existential philosophy and psychology are highly relevant for addressing such issues. Building on previous attempts to bring in existential themes and terminology to HCI, this paper argues that Yalom’s notion of “the givens of existence”, as well as related work in experimental existential psychology, can inform the development of an existential inquiry framework in HCI. The envisioned framework is intended to complement current approaches in HCI by specifically focusing on the existential aspects of the design and use of technology. The paper reflects on possible ways, in which existential concepts can support HCI research, and maintains that adopting an existential framework in HCI would be consistent with the overall conceptual development of the field.2018VKVictor KaptelininUmeå UniversityPrivacy by Design & User ControlTechnology Ethics & Critical HCICHI
The Meaning of Interactivity—Some Proposals for Definitions and MeasuresNew interactive applications, artifacts, and systems are constantly being added to our environments, and there are some concerns in the human– computer interaction research community that increasing interactivity might not be just to the good. But what is it that is supposed to be increasing, and how could we determine whether it is? To approach these issues in a systematic and analytical fashion, relying less on common intuitions and more on clearly defined concepts and when possible quanti- fiable properties, we take a renewed look at the notion of interactivity and related concepts. The main contribution of this article is a number of definitions and terms, and the beginning of an attempt to frame the conditions of interaction and interactivity. Based on this framing, we also propose some possible approaches for how interactivity can be measured.2018LJLars-Erik Janlert et al.Umeå UniversityUser Research Methods (Interviews, Surveys, Observation)Prototyping & User TestingCHI