Saadi Lahlou

Privacy and trust issues with invisible computers

A set of designer guidelines from the European Union offers the first step in building privacy-aware systems.

How can we capture the subject's perspective? An evidence-based approach for the social scientist

This paper addresses the methodological gap that impedes the collection of empirical data on subjective experience. It describes a new family of methods for social science research (Subjective Evidence-Based Ethnography: SEBE). The methods are based on: first-person audio-visual recording with a miniature video-camera worn at eye-level (‘subcam’); confronting subjects with these first-person recordings to collect their subjective experience; formulating the findings and discussing the final interpretation with the subjects. These procedures enable subjects to reconstruct and describe their psychological state at the moment of action, especially their goals, by reviewing films of their own activity recorded from their own perspective with subcams. These films provide situated records of actual activity in natural environments, without the need of an external observer. This approach, by providing both detailed records of actual activity and evidence-based accounts of the subject’s own mental processes, supports grounded progress in ethnography, psychology, ergonomics, sociology and the social sciences in general. There are also applications for training and cross-cultural contacts. The techniques are described in sufficient detail for the reader to make use of them. Examples of applications are provided and limitations are discussed.

Observing Cognitive Work in Offices

The information revolution has a deep impact on office work. To create better environments for cognitive workers, we designed two observation tools recording office activity. The Subcam (subjective camera) is a miniature, wearable, wide angle video camera, clipped on a pair of glasses; it records individual activity from a subjective point of view, wherever the user goes. The Offsat (office satellite) takes a picture every minute from the ceiling, showing long term evolution in the spatial distribution of information artifacts (piles, etc.), and measuring the distribution of gross activity (meetings, stand alone computing, etc.). We currently use these tool in a series of new furniture and information artifact design experiments.

Smart artefacts as affordances for awareness in distributed teams

The manifolds of spaces and places we are entering, populating, transiently crossing and eventually leaving (only to immerse in another subsequent context) as part of our daily activities in our personal, public and professional lives are undergoing a dramatic change. Although this change is taking place we are aware of it only in a limited fashion due to its unobtrusive character as illustrated in the statement by Streitz and Nixon (2005): “It seems like a paradox but it will soon become reality: The rate at which computers disappear will be matched by the rate at which information technology will increasingly permeate our environment and our lives”.

Peut-on changer les comportements alimentaires ?

The naive model of feeding behaviour determination, stating it stems from individual conscious will, is widespread but fallacious and roots many a failure in diets and public health campaigns. Feeding behaviour is determined at three levels: technico-economics, psychology, and sociology. Individual capacity of change, facing a whole system of affordances and habits, is limited. Changes are possible, but not when relying upon individual will alone. We list some realistic paths to foster and support change.

Subjective Evidence Based Ethnography: Method and Applications

Subjective Evidence Based Ethnography (SEBE) is a method designed to access subjective experience. It uses First Person Perspective (FPP) digital recordings as a basis for analytic Replay Interviews (RIW) with the participants. This triggers their memory and enables a detailed step by step understanding of activity: goals, subgoals, determinants of actions, decision-making processes, etc. This paper describes the technique and two applications. First, the analysis of professional practices for know-how transferring purposes in industry is illustrated with the analysis of nuclear power-plant operators’ gestures. This shows how SEBE enables modelling activity, describing good and bad practices, risky situations, and expert tacit knowledge. Second, the analysis of full days lived by Polish mothers taking care of their children is described, with a specific focus on how they manage their eating and drinking. This research has been done on a sub-sample of a large scale intervention designed to increase plain water drinking vs sweet beverages. It illustrates the interest of SEBE as an exploratory technique in complement to other more classic approaches such as questionnaires and behavioural diaries. It provides the detailed “how” of the effects that are measured at aggregate level by other techniques.

Through the Creator's Eyes: Using the Subjective Camera to Study Craft Creativity.

This article addresses a methodological gap in the study of creativity: the difficulty of capturing the microgenesis of creative action in ways that would reflect both its psychological and behavioral dynamics. It explores the use of subjective camera (subcam) by research participants as part of an adapted Subjective Evidence-Based Ethnography (SEBE). This methodology combines (a) obtaining first person audio-visual recordings of creative action with a miniature video-camera worn at eye-level, (b) accessing the subjective experience of the participant through a confrontation interview based on the recording, and (c) formulating interpretations and discussing them with the participant. Illustrations of the technique are offered from a study of craft creativity, chosen as a test ground for its micro-level forms of creative expression. Findings exemplify how the technique enables microscopic description of creativity at both process and content levels. The benefits, limitations, and possible applications of the method are considered in the broader context of creativity studies.

Digitization and transmission of human experience

Transmission of human experience is essential for many purposes. It has two aspects: content and social relations. Digital technologies can solve some of the classic issues around the capture and transmission of human experience. Using these new technical affordances as a basis, this article presents a framework to capture and describe human activity and experience based on video and cooperative explicitation of activity trajectories with the subject, using a transition model inspired by the formalism of dynamical systems. The article also introduces this special issue, ‘Digitize and Transfer’, and gives an overview of its contents. La transmission de l’expérience humaine est un enjeu fondamental pour l’espèce. Elle a deux aspects: le contenu et la relation sociale. Les technologies numériques peuvent résoudre certains des problèmes classiques de la capture et la transmission de l’expérience humaine. En s’appuyant sur ces nouvelles possibilités techniques, ce document présente un nouveau cadre pour capturer et décrire l’activité humaine et l’expérience. On utilise la vidéo et un entretien d’explicitation des trajectoires d’activité avec les sujets, en faisant appel au modèle des ‘transitions’ inspiré du formalisme des systèmes dynamiques. Ce document introduit également ce numéro spécial ‘Numériser et transmettre’, et donne un aperçu critique des articles qui le composent.

Capter et transférer le savoir incorporé dans un geste professionnel

Les savoirs experts dans le monde professionnel sont difficiles à capter en raison de leur nature en grande part tacite (difficilement verbalisable). On détaille ici un ensemble de méthodes et techniques (capture numérique du geste en vue subjective et en vue externe; protocole de verbalisation guidé par les buts en situation; entretiens d’auto-confrontation et de reconstruction) qui permettent de récupérer ces savoir-faire en coopération entre l’analyste et l’expert-geste. Le protocole vise: (1) à reconstruire avec l’expert la logique intentionnelle du geste, son modèle mental; et (2) à le montrer au mieux au travers de la vidéo, pour que d’autres puissent le comprendre et l’internaliser à leur tour. Ce protocole de capture aboutit à la réalisation d’un support multimédia pour la représentation et la transmission du savoir-faire métier. L’approche s’inscrit dans une perspective de gestion des connaissances (approche globale, du point de vue de l’organisation, souci pédagogique), adopte une posture proche de celle de l’ergonomie (sympathie pour l’acteur, observation détaillée in situ), et utilise des théories et méthodes issues de la psychologie cognitive et de l’ethnographie numérique. Les principaux cadres théoriques mobilisés sont les théories de l’activité et de la qualité perçue. Expert knowledge in the professional world is difficult to capture because of its largely tacit nature (difficult to verbalize). We detail here a set of methods and techniques (dual digital video capture with subjective and external perspective; situated goal-oriented verbalization protocol; self-confrontation and reconstruction interviews) that help recover the know-how by cooperation between analyst and expert. The protocol aims to: (1) reconstruct the intentions of the experts, their mental models; and (2) produce training video material for novices to learn and internalize the practice. Based on this protocol we have realized a multimedia platform for the representation and transmission of professional know-how. This approach takes the perspective of knowledge management (organizational approach, attention to training), adopts an ergonomic posture (sympathy for the actor, detailed field observation), and uses theories and methods from cognitive psychology and digital ethnography. The major theoretical frameworks mobilized are those of activity theory and perceived quality.

The impact of a threatening e‐mail reprimand on the recipient's blood pressure

Purpose – This article aims to describe the effects of the communication style of the message sender (threatening or neutral), status of the sender (equal to or higher than the recipient) and the power relationship between sender and recipient (from the same department or not) on the blood pressure of the recipient of an e‐mail messageDesign/methodology/approach – The study was conducted under controlled laboratory conditions. The experiment was a mixed design, using both within and between subjects variables. The independent variable for the within subjects factor was the task that participants performed. There were three tasks: answering a questionnaire, reading a non‐threateningly worded e‐mail reprimand, and reading a threateningly worded e‐mail reprimand. Although the study used students as participants, the messages they received were from real people in a University College. Discusses the implications in the area of occupational health.Findings – Diastolic blood pressure was significantly higher (p...