Andy Darby

Exercising playfully: co-designing fun ways of keeping active in the park

In this work in progress paper we present our work in the co-design of a playful interactive artifact that encourages people to engage in casual physical activity in the park. The initial testing of our proof-of-concept prototype received extremely positive feedback as a potential way of motivating people to keep active in the park and in bridging the generation gap.

In the eye of a hurricane there is quiet, for just a moment, -

CHI can be a multisensory overload. Attendees endure days of workshops, presentations, evening parties, and ephemeral interactions. This paper attempts to disrupt that onslaught of activities [9]. It draws inspiration from theories and methods already in HCI - e.g. mindfulness [1], reflective design [8], and slow design [4, 7] - to bring eight pages of silence to the conference. This is meant to disrupt CHIs busy schedule and help attendees foster resilience. In pursuit of these aims, the authors will use the time and pages offered by this paper to facilitate a group silence; quiet, for just a moment, in the midst of the hurricane that is CHI.

Design Fictions: A Tool for Debating Societal, Legal and Ethical Aspects of Personal and Pervasive Health Systems

The potential benefits offered by health-related technologies are counterpoised by the societal, legal and ethical challenges concomitant with the pervasive monitoring of people necessitated by such technological interventions. Through the ProtoPolicy research project we explored the production and use of design fictions as a tool for debating the societal, legal and ethical dimensions of personal health systems. Two design fictions were co-created and tested in a series of design workshops with community groups based in Lancashire and Cornwall, UK. A thematic analysis of a debate among older people from the Lancaster group on the Smart Object Therapist design fiction highlighted societal and ethical issues relevant to personal health system design. We conclude that ethics like ‘usability’ may be usefully based on engagement with directly or indirectly implicated publics and should not be designed into innovation by experts alone.

Planting and Tending Digital-nature Hybrids in a Walled Kitchen Garden

This paper presents various digital-nature artifacts designed to support visitor engagement in a National Trust garden environment. While selected critical theory guided the initial design of interpretation artifacts, we discuss how a research through design approach (RtD) and our attendance at the Research through Design (RTD) 2015 conference informed our subsequent design practice, notably in relation to iterations of the artifacts. In particular, we reflect on how each design iteration within the RtD process revealed knowledge about materials, values, engagement and place.

Active Parks: 'Phygital' urban games for sedentary and older people

We present our work in the Active Parks project, aimed at encouraging older and sedentary people to take casual physical exercise in urban spaces, such as parks. This is achieved through the co-design of playful ‘phygital’ (physical and digital) artefacts and games to be installed in the park. The initial testing of our proof-of-concept prototype received extremely positive feedback as a potential way of motivating people to keep active in the park and in bridging the generation gap.