We examined how mediated cues of group emotion influence the emotional state of the members of a non-co-located group when performing knowledge-work tasks in a laboratory. The emotion displayed was determined by the experimenter and the participants were led to believe that there were three other group members simultaneously performing the same tasks (four routine tasks and four planning tasks) in different rooms. Prevailing emotional state of the group (depressed, nervous/stressed, pleasantly excited and pleasantly relaxed), allegedly based on self-report, was displayed in textual format on a web page before the first task and after each task. Facial electromyographic (EMG) activity and electrodermal activity (EDA) were recorded during task performance. Negative cues of group emotion elicited lower self-reported pleasure, lower perceived confidence in the other group members, higher corrugator supercilii EMG activity and higher EDA compared with cues of positive group emotions. Planning tasks elicited higher self-reported pleasure and arousal, lower corrugator EMG activity, and higher EDA compared with routine tasks. The results suggest that mediated textual cues of group emotion can lead to emotional contagion to the individual group members during distributed knowledge work.

To understand how implicit and explicit biofeedback work in games, we developed a first-person shooter (FPS) game to experiment with different biofeedback techniques. While this area has seen plenty of discussion, there is little rigorous experimentation addressing how biofeedback can enhance human-computer interaction. In our two-part study, (N=36) subjects first played eight different game stages with two implicit biofeedback conditions, with two simulation-based comparison and repetition rounds, then repeated the two biofeedback stages when given explicit information on the biofeedback. The biofeedback conditions were respiration and skin-conductance (EDA) adaptations. Adaptation targets were four balanced player avatar attributes. We collected data with psycho¬physiological measures (electromyography, respiration, and EDA), a game experience questionnaire, and game-play measures.

Traditionally, mobile media sharing and messaging has been studied from the perspective of an individual author making media available to other users. With the aim of supporting spectator groups at large-scale events, we developed a messaging application for camera phones with the idea of collectively created albums called Media Stories. The field trial at a rally competition pointed out the collective and participative practices involved in the creation and sense-making of media, challenging the view of individual authorship. Members contributed actively to producing chains of messages in Media Stories, with more than half of the members as authors on average in each story. Observations indicate the centrality of collocated viewing and creation in the use of media. Design implications include providing a ""common space"" and possibilities of creating collective objects, adding features that enrich collocated collective use, and supporting the active construction of awareness and social presence through the created media.

In this paper we present MAR (Mobile Augmented Reality) Toolkit as an easy-to-use augmented reality toolset for building multi-user mobile phone games. It is built on top of MUPE - Nokia-developed open source mobile platform based on Java - which considers the special qualities of mobile technology. MAR Toolkit contains four components, map interface (MAP), physical object tagger (POT), public display (PUD) and silent communicator (SIC).We have successfully demonstrated MAR Toolkit by implementing a game named as Mupeland Yard based on classical board game Scotland Yard. In user testing we found that common usability issues related to mobile technology and MUPE-platform troubled the tests. However, especially POT component raised interest among developers. We found that using graphical 2D-tags for providing location information for augmented reality games is a simple and robust alternative for more technology intensive GPS and cell-ID information.

In this paper, we describe a framework for a personalization system to systematically induce desired emotion and attention related states and promote information processing in viewers of online advertising and e-commerce product information. Psychological Customization entails personalization of the way of presenting information (user interface, visual layouts, modalities, structures) per user to create desired transient psychological effects and states, such as emotion, attention, involvement, presence, persuasion and learning. Conceptual foundations and empiric evidence for the approach are presented.