Virtual box: supporting mediated family intimacy through virtual and physical play

ABSTRACT

Mediated intimacy is the phenomenon where humans use technologies to express, share, or communicate intimate feelings with each other. Typically, technologies supporting mediated intimacy encompass different characteristics than technologies designed to solve specific work-oriented tasks. This paper reports on the design, implementation and initial evaluation of Virtual Box. Virtual Box attempts to create a physical and engaging context in order to support reciprocal interactions with expressive content. An implemented version of Virtual Box is evaluated in a location-aware environment to evaluate the design ideas according to mediated family intimacy.

References

1. Barley, N. Lost and Found: Critical Voices in New British Design. Birkhauser Verlag AG, 1999. ISBN: 376436095X.
2. Chang, A., Resner, B., Koerner, B., Wang, X. and Ishii, H. LumiTouch: an emotional communication device. CHI '01: CHI '01 extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2001), 313--314.
3. Cheok, A. D., Goh, K. H., Liu, W., Farbiz, F., Fong, S. W., Teo, S. L., Li, Y. and Yang, X. Human Pacman: a mobile, wide-area entertainment system based on physical, social, and ubiquitous computing. Personal Ubiquitous Comp., Springer-Verlag, 2, 8 (2004), 71--81.
4. Counts, S. and Fellheimer, E. Supporting social presence through lightweight photo sharing on and off the desktop. CHI '04: Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2004), 599--606.
5. Dahlbäck, N., Jönsson, A. and Ahrenberg, L. Wizard of Oz studies: why and how. Proceedings of the 1st international conference on Intelligent user interfaces, ACM Press (1993), 193--200.
6. Davis, H., Francis, P., Benda, P., Gibbs, M., Howard, S. and Vetere, F. Bridging the Intergenerational Divide: Implications of Employing Cultural Probes in Distributed Homes. OzChi, (2005).
7. Gaver, B. Provocative Awareness. Comput. Supported Coop. Work, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 3, 11 (2002), 475--493.
8. Goodman, E. and Misilim, M. The Sensing Beds. Proceedings of UbiComp, Workshop (2003).
9. Höysniemi, J. and Read, J. Wizard of Oz Studies with Children. Workshop on Child Computer Interaction: Methodological Research at Interact 2005, (2005).
10. Höysniemi, J., Hämäläinen, P. and Turkki, L. Wizard of Oz prototyping of computer vision based action games for children. IDC '04: Proceeding of the 2004 conference on Interaction design and children, ACM Press (2004), 27--34.
11. Kaye, J., Levitt, M. K., Nevins, J., Golden, J. and Schmidt, V. Communicating intimacy one bit at a time. CHI '05: CHI '05 extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2005), 1529--1532.
12. Markopoulos, P., Romero, N., Baren, J. v., Wijn,, IJsselsteijn,, Ruyter, B. d. and Farshchian, B. Keeping in touch with the family: home and away with the ASTRA awareness system. CHI '04: extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, ACM (2004), 1351--1354.
13. Mueller, F., Vetere, F., Gibbs, M. R., Kjeldskov, J., Pedell, S. and Howard, S. Hug over a distance. CHI '05: CHI '05 extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2005), 1673--1676.
14. Mueller, F., Agamanolis, S. and Picard, R. Exertion interfaces: sports over a distance for social bonding and fun. CHI '03: Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2003), 561--568.
15. Mynatt, E. D., Rowan, J., Craighill, S. and Jacobs, A. Digital family portraits: supporting peace of mind for extended family members. CHI '01: Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2001), 333--340.
16. Persson, P., Espinoza, F. and Cacciatore, E. GeoNotes: social enhancement of physical space. CHI '01: CHI '01 extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2001), 43--44.
17. Read, J., Mazzone, E. and Höysniemi, J. Wizárd of Oz Evaluations with Children -- Deception and Discovery. Interaction Design and Children, (2005),.
18. Siio, I., Rowan, J. and Mynatt, E. Peek-a-drawer: communication by furniture. CHI '02: CHI '02 extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2002), 582--583.
19. Stougaard, M. Technologies for Families: Understand and Design for Mediated Parent-Child Intimacy. Aalborg Universitet, (2006)
20. Strauss, A. and Corbin, J. Basics of Qualitative Research -- Grounded Theory Procedures and Techniques. SAGE Publications, 1990. ISBN: 0-8039-32-51-0.
21. Strong, R. and Gaver, B. Feather, Scent, and Shaker: Supporting Simple Intimacy. Proceedings of CSCW'96, New York, NY, USA (1996), 16--20.
22. Vetere, F., Gibbs, M. R., Kjeldskov, J., Howard, S., Mueller, F., Pedell, S., Mecoles, K. and Bunyan, M. Mediating intimacy: designing technologies to support strong-tie relationships. CHI '05: Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2005), 471--480.
23. Vetere, F., Davis, H., Gibbs, M. R., Francis, P. and Howard, S. A magic box for understanding intergenerational play. CHI '06: CHI '06 extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2006), 1475--1480.
24. Vetere, F., Nolan, M. and Raman, R. A. (2006) "Distributed Hide and Seek" OZCHI, Sydney, Australia (20--24 Nov), 4 pages
25. Zhou, Z., Cheok, A. D., Li, Y. and Kato, H. Magic cubes for social and physical family entertainment. CHI '05: CHI '05 extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2005), 1156--1157.

Index Terms

• Human-centered computing

  • Collaborative and social computing

    • Collaborative and social computing theory, concepts and paradigms

      • Computer supported cooperative work

• Social and professional topics

  • Professional topics

    • Computing and business

      • Computer supported cooperative work