Advancement: Designing for play that permeates our lives: playful technology that responds to people's socio-emotional needs

Speaker Name:

Ferran Altarriba Bertran

Speaker Title:

PhD Student

Start Time:

Thursday, April 2, 2020 - 10:00am

End Time:

Thursday, April 2, 2020 - 11:00am

Location:

via Zoom presentation

Abstract: Computation increasingly mediates in our lives. More and more, it permeates all kinds of mundane activities and situations, shaping both our actions and our experiences of the world. Importantly, that is not only true for the workplace: technology is equally present in multiple other domains (e.g., the household, or the public space), and it must thus respond to diverse values and agendas. As such, computation should be responsible for much more than keeping us productive—it can also play a role in enriching our social and emotional lives. My research investigates how to design technology that contributes to our socio-emotional well-being by giving us chances to engage playfully with the world that surrounds us.

In this talk, I will present my ongoing research and intended three-fold contribution. First, conceptual: I will describe key experiential qualities of play that are socio-emotionally desirable and explore how they might inspire technology design. Second, methodological: I will discuss the challenges of designing for play that permeates mundane activity, and will propose a work-in-progress set of strategies for doing that. Third, practice-focused: I will describe my ongoing design work exploring how those concepts and methodologies might inspire the design of playful technology, using as a case study a widely relatable area of human life: food practices. Overall, I hope that my research will appeal to interaction designers interested in leveraging the socio-emotional potential of playful engagement in their technology designs.

Event Type:

Adancement/Defense

Advisor:

Katherine Isbister

Graduate Program:

Computational Media PhD