Halley Profita

Don't mind me touching my wrist: a case study of interacting with on-body technology in public

Wearable technology, specifically e-textiles, offers the potential for interacting with electronic devices in a whole new manner. However, some may find the operation of a system that employs non-traditional on-body interactions uncomfortable to perform in a public setting, impacting how readily a new form of mobile technology may be received. Thus, it is important for interaction designers to take into consideration the implications of on-body gesture interactions when designing wearable interfaces. In this study, we explore the third-party perceptions of a users interactions with a wearable e-textile interface. This two-prong evaluation examines the societal perceptions of a user interacting with the textile interface at different on-body locations, as well as the observers attitudes toward on-body controller placement. We performed the study in the United States and South Korea to gain cultural insights into the perceptions of on-body technology usage.

The AT Effect: How Disability Affects the Perceived Social Acceptability of Head-Mounted Display Use

Wearable computing devices offer new possibilities to increase accessibility and independence for individuals with disabilities. However, the adoption of such devices may be influenced by social factors, and useful devices may not be adopted if they are considered inappropriate to use. While public policy may adapt to support accommodations for assistive technology, emerging technologies may be unfamiliar or unaccepted by bystanders. We surveyed 1200 individuals about the use of a head-mounted display in a public setting, examining how information about the users disability affected judgments of the social acceptability of the scenario. Our findings reveal that observers considered head-mounted display use more socially acceptable if the device was being used to support a person with a disability.

Pt Viz: towards a wearable device for visualizing knee rehabilitation exercises

We present a wearable sensory display for visualizing knee rehabilitation as part of an in-home physical therapy program. Currently, patients undergoing knee rehabilitation have limited ways of assessing exercise form and extent of movement at home. To address this issue, we developed an exploratory wearable electronic prototype to visualize knee bend. We evaluated the device with physical therapy patients to get feedback on the design and to help us understand some of the challenges they face. We discovered that our current design is better suited for patients recovering from surgery as opposed to patients with chronic conditions.

The Multiple Dispositions of On-Body and Wearable Devices

When considering the design of wearable and mobile systems, a user-centered approach is useful, particularly if it focuses on tailoring a given application to a users task. In doing so, its equally important to account for the on-body aspects of mobile devices, which often remain on the person beyond a single moment of use. In this article, the authors present their work on dispositions, which provides designers guidance that can help them more fully account for the on-body nature of wearable devices. Using dispositions, designers can consider the tradeoffs between device capability and user requirements inherent in the different modes of wearable use. The authors illustrate the use of dispositions with two case studies and discuss the resulting design implications. This article is part of a special issue on wearable computing.

The social comfort of wearable technology and gestural interaction.

The “wearability” of wearable technology addresses the factors that affect the degree of comfort the wearer experiences while wearing a device, including physical, psychological, and social aspects. While the physical and psychological aspects of wearing technology have been investigated since early in the development of the field of wearable computing, the social aspects of wearability have been less fully-explored. As wearable technology becomes increasingly common on the commercial market, social wearability is becoming an ever-more-important variable contributing to the success or failure of new products. Here we present an analysis of social aspects of wearability within the context of the greater understanding of wearability in wearable technology, and focus on selected theoretical frameworks for understanding how wearable products are perceived and evaluated in a social context. Qualitative results from a study of social acceptability of on-body interactions are presented as a case study of social wearability.

Textile Interfaces: Embroidered Jog-Wheel, Beaded Tilt Sensor, Twisted Pair Ribbon, and Sound Sequins

Electronic textiles (or e-textiles) attempt to integrate electronics and computing into fabric. In our efforts to create new e-textile interfaces and construction techniques for our Electronic Textile Interface Swatch Book (an e-textile toolkit), we have created a multi-use jog wheel using multilayer embroidery, sound sequins from PVDF film and a tilt sensor using a hanging bead, embroidery and capacitive sensing. In order to make capacitive sensing over long leads possible on the body, we have constructed twisted pair ribbon and demonstrated its effectiveness over more typical sensing techniques. We detail construction techniques and lessons learned from this technology exploration.

Flutter: An Exploration of an Assistive Garment Using Distributed Sensing, Computation and Actuation

Assistive technology (AT) has the ability to improve the standard of living of those with disabilities, however, it can often be abandoned for aesthetic or stigmatizing reasons. Garment-based AT offers novel opportunities to address these issues as it can stay with the user to continuously monitor and convey relevant information, is non-invasive, and can provide aesthetically pleasing alternatives. In an effort to overcome traditional AT and wearable computing challenges including, cumbersome hardware constraints and social acceptability, we present Flutter, a fashion-oriented wearable AT. Flutter seamlessly embeds low-profile networked sensing, computation, and actuation to facilitate sensory augmentation for those with hearing loss. The miniaturized distributed hardware enables both textile integration and new methods to pair fashion with function, as embellishments are functionally leveraged to complement technology integration. Finally, we discuss future applications and broader implications of using such computationally-enabled textile wearables to support sensory augmentation beyond the realm of AT.

Detecting and Identifying Tactile Gestures using Deep Autoencoders, Geometric Moments and Gesture Level Features

While several sensing modalities and transduction approaches have been developed for tactile sensing in robotic skins, there has been much less work towards extracting features for or identifying high-level gestures performed on the skin. In this paper, we investigate using deep neural networks with hidden Markov models (DNN-HMMs), geometric moments and gesture level features to identify a set of gestures performed on robotic skins. We demonstrate that these features are useful for identifying gestures, and predict a set of gestures from a 14-class dataset with 56% accuracy, and a 7-class dataset with 71% accuracy.

Online Information Search Performance and Search Strategies in a Health Problem-Solving Scenario

Although access to Internet health information can be beneficial, solving complex health-related problems online is challenging for many individuals. In this study, we investigated the performance of a sample of 60 adults ages 18 to 85 years in using the Internet to resolve a relatively complex health information problem. The impact of age, Internet experience, and cognitive abilities on measures of search time, amount of search, and search accuracy was examined, and a model of Internet information seeking was developed to guide the characterization of participants’ search strategies. Internet experience was found to have no impact on performance measures. Older participants exhibited longer search times and lower amounts of search but similar search accuracy performance as their younger counterparts. Overall, greater search accuracy was related to an increased amount of search but not to increased search duration and was primarily attributable to higher cognitive abilities, such as processing speed, reasoning ability, and executive function. There was a tendency for those who were younger, had greater Internet experience, and had higher cognitive abilities to use a bottom-up (i.e., analytic) search strategy, although use of a top-down (i.e., browsing) strategy was not necessarily unsuccessful. Implications of the findings for future studies and design interventions are discussed.

Nothing to Hide: Aesthetic Customization of Hearing Aids and Cochlear Implants in an Online Community

Hearing aids and cochlear implants can improve accessibility and quality of life for people with hearing impairments. However, use of these devices may cause concern amongst some users due to sociocultural issues such as unwanted attention and perceived stigma. While some individuals may respond to these concerns by attempting to conceal their devices, or even abandoning their devices, others have responded by making their devices more visible through aesthetic customization, and some have begun to share these customizations online. In this paper, we describe community interactions in an online forum dedicated to customized hearing aids and cochlear implants. We found that community members discussed customization tools and techniques, shared their customizations, and provided each other with encouragement and support. Community members customized their devices as a means of self-expression that demonstrated the wearers fashion sense, revealed favorite sports teams and characters, and marked holidays and personal milestones. Our findings may inform the design of assistive technologies that better support personalization, customization, and self-expression.