Abstract
Wearable technologies are increasingly popular, but often abandoned. Given their highly personal nature, aesthetics and form factor play a key role in adoption and continued use, but thus far little work has focused on this. This paper presents a three-part study to better understand the role of aesthetics and personalisation within wearables. We provided 15 participants with customised, low-fidelity, nonfunctional “activity trackers”, based on their own designs, for in the wild evaluation. Our participants’ use of these prototypes provided us with insights into their feelings towards their existing commercial devices and their own designs alike. We found that aesthetics plays an important, and currently underappreciated, role in use and continued engagement, particularly when the context of use is considered. We suggest that manufacturers should embrace adaptability and DIY cultures, allowing end-users to customise their wearables and support them in appropriately choosing, and creating their own designs.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | CHI 2018 - Extended Abstracts of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
Subtitle of host publication | Engage with CHI |
Publisher | Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) |
Volume | 2018-April |
ISBN (Electronic) | 9781450356206, 9781450356213 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 21 Apr 2018 |
Event | 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI EA 2018 - Montreal, Canada Duration: 21 Apr 2018 → 26 Apr 2018 https://chi2018.acm.org |
Conference
Conference | 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI EA 2018 |
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Country/Territory | Canada |
City | Montreal |
Period | 21/04/18 → 26/04/18 |
Internet address |
Research Groups and Themes
- Bristol Interaction Group
Keywords
- Activity trackers
- Aesthetics
- Personalisation
- User-centred design
- Wearables