Abstract The expanding interest in justice-oriented HCI focusing on critical perspectives, structural oppression, and marginalization—often referred to as social justice—is reflected in a growing number of publications over the past few years. Through the continuous growth of social justice in HCI, we argue that now is a good time to provide an overview of the ongoing and current streams of social justice research. We introduce social justice as it has grown in HCI during the last 15 years followed by the most commonly framed theoretical tenets. Secondly, we construct a corpus of 60 HCI articles building on social justice as the main concept. Through our corpus we summarize and present 4 currently ongoing streams of research to further a cohesive, yet fluid understanding of how social justice is shaped and understood within HCI. Describing these interconnected streams also gives us the possibility to frame and describe the current development and move forward as a research community. Based on our study and discussions, we suggest 6 considerations for HCI researchers seeking to work with social justice as a concept, and we emphasize the need for long-term engagement in justice-oriented research to foreground and enable societal change and social good. Through this study, we contribute to the ongoing growth of social justice research in HCI by providing an overview of current streams and ways forward.

This paper presents a long-term field study of the coMorphing stool: a computational thing that can change shape in response to the surrounding light. We deployed 5 coMorphing stools to 5 participants' homes over 9 months. As co-speculators, the participants reflected on their mediated relations with the coMorphing stool. Findings suggest that they perceived the subtle transformations of the coMorphing stool in the early days of the deployment. After becoming familiar with these features, they interpreted their daily entanglements with the coMorphing stool in diverse personalized ways. Over time, the co-speculators accepted the coMorphing stool as part of their homes. These findings contribute new empirical insights to the shape-changing research field in HCI and enrich discussions on higher-level concepts in postphenomenology. Reflecting on these experiences promotes further HCI explorations on computational things.

Abstract In the ongoing turn to automation, the growing trend towards the design of conditionally and highly automated vehicles (C/HAV) is evident. In a CAV, the driver no longer needs to partake in the driving. However, the vehicle might send a takeover request (TOR) when the CAV’s system reaches its operational boundaries, i.e. a call for a transition from autonomous to manual drive. Previous research on TORs has focused on the context of urgent situations, e.g. hazards and unpredictable events. Furthermore, it has been noted that drivers’ situation awareness (SA) deteriorates after being in autonomous drive. However, less is known about TORs in non-urgent situations. Motivated by this need, the study explores how design friction can serve as a guiding concept for transferring control between autonomous and manual drive in non-urgent situations to increase situation awareness. Design friction is defined as elements of interactions that steer attention and guides the driver to take informed decisions. The work resulted in prototypes that leveraged design friction as part of a takeover sequence. The proposed design was empirically evaluated in a fixed-base medium-fidelity driving simulator. The results indicated that the level of friction might have been too extensive, as some annoyance was expressed. However, participants claimed to feel calm and aware of their surroundings at the moment of regaining control of the vehicle. This suggests that design friction is a promising tool for guiding concept design to enhance transitions from autonomous to manual drive.

Abstract Interaction design/HCI seems to be at a crossroads. On the one hand, it is still about designing for engaging user experiences (UX). Still, on the other hand, it seems to be increasingly about reducing interaction and automating human–machine interaction through the use of AI and other new technologies. In this paper, we explore this seemingly unavoidable gap. First, we discuss the fundamental design rationality underpinning interaction and automation of interaction from the viewpoints of classic theoretical standpoints. We then illustrate how these two come together in interaction design practice. Here we examine four examples from already published research on automation of interaction, including how different levels of automation of interaction affect or enable new practices, including coffee making, self-tracking, automated driving, and conversations with AI-based chatbots. Through an interaction analysis of these four examples, we show (1) how interaction and automation are combined in the design, (2) how interaction is dependent on a certain level of automation, and vice versa, and (3) how each example illustrates a different balance between, and integration of interaction and automation. Based on this analysis, we propose a two-dimensional design space as a conceptual construct that takes these aspects into account to understand and analyze ways of combining interaction and automation in interaction design. We illustrate the use of the proposed two-dimensional design space, discuss its theoretical implications, and suggest it as a useful tool—when designing for engaging user experiences (UX), with interaction and automation as two design materials.

Since the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML), researchers have asked how intelligent computing systems could interact with and relate to their users and their surroundings, leading to debates around issues of biased AI systems, ML black-box, user trust, user’s perception of control over the system, and system’s transparency, to name a few. All of these issues are related to how humans interact with AI or ML systems, through an interface which uses different interaction modalities. Prior studies address these issues from a variety of perspectives, spanning from understanding and framing the problems through ethics and Science and Technology Studies (STS) perspectives to finding effective technical solutions to the problems. But what is shared among almost all those efforts is an assumption that if systems can explain the how and why of their predictions, people will have a better perception of control and therefore will trust such systems more, and even can correct their shortcomings. This research field has been called Explainable AI (XAI). In this studio, we take stock on prior efforts in this area; however, we focus on using Tangible and Embodied Interaction (TEI) as an interaction modality for understanding ML. We note that the affordances of physical forms and their behaviors potentially can not only contribute to the explainability of ML systems, but also can contribute to an open environment for criticism. This studio seeks to both critique explainable ML terminology and to map the opportunities that TEI can offer to the HCI for designing more sustainable, graspable and just intelligent systems.

Abstract ‘Time’ and ‘temporality’ are increasingly addressed in human-computer interaction (HCI) research. From issues related to mapping and visualizing data along timelines via explorations of temporality as a design material to studies of lag and the rhythms of work, time is a recurring perspective in HCI research. In fact, time has been a recurring aspect in HCI research for the past 30 years. Based on this continuous and growing interest in HCI research, we find it to be a good time to explore if ‘time’ can be used as a way to structure and organize HCI research. In this paper, we make one such attempt based on a literature study in which we have focused on how time and temporality has been addressed in HCI research during the past 30 years. In our overview of the field, we explore how time and temporality has played out in HCI along the two dimensions of what and how it has been studied. Based on these two dimensions, we created a 4 × 4 matrix that allowed us to filter the material and categorize HCI research in relation to time and temporality. As a result of our explorations, we have identified a turn to temporality as a design material in HCI, an interest in methods for temporality studies in HCI and in temporality as a theoretical lens. We end with a discussion of some implications of our findings around the notions of (i) waves of time and temporality studies in HCI research, (ii) the potential use of the 4 × 4 matrix and (iii) the consequences of a more fundamental shift from things to events.

Buildings and urban spaces increasingly incorporate artificial intelligence and new forms of interactivity, raising a wide span of research questions about the future of human experiences with, and within, built environments. We call this emerging area Human-Building Interaction (HBI) and introduce it as an interdisciplinary domain of research interfacing Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) with Architecture and Urban Design. HBI seeks to examine the involvement of HCI in studying and steering the evolution of built environments. Therefore, we need to ask foundational questions such as the following: what are the specific attributes of built environments that HCI researchers should take into account when shifting attention and scale from “artefacts” to “environments”? Are architecture and interaction design methods and processes compatible? Concretely, how can a team of interaction designers bring their tools to an architectural project, and collaborate with other stakeholders? Can and will architecture change the theory and practice of HCI? Furthermore, research in HBI should produce knowledge and practical guidelines by experimenting novel design instances that combine architecture and digital interaction. The primary aim of this article is to specify the mission, vision, and scope of research in HBI. As the introductory article to the TOCHI special issue, it also provides a summary of published manuscripts and describes their collective contribution to the development of this field.

Mobile computing is one of the most important paradigms to influence and enhance modern e-services, mainly due to its anytime and anywhere availability adding value to the delivered service. In a traditional e-government context, the service life cycle takes the form of citizens consuming services provided by public sector bodies. In this paper, we use a novel concept combining mobile e-services and open data to extend and allow possible citizen-driven continuation of the service life cycle. The concept is evaluated throughout the design process, and also becomes the subject of a focus group. Our most important conclusions are that the concept design extends the service life cycle within the public sector context, and also creates new entrances for citizens to participate in generating and acquiring open data, thus transforming citizens' involvement. The result is increased co-operation, as well as increased adoption and availability of data and e-services, enhancing citizen participation.

Advances in the creation of computational materials are transforming our thinking about relations between the physical and digital. In this paper we characterize this transformation as a "material turn" within the field of interaction design. Central to theorizing tangibility, we advocate supporting this turn by developing a vocabulary capable of articulating strategies for computational material design. By exploring the term texture, a material property signifying relations between surfaces, structures, and forms, we demonstrate how concepts spanning the physical and digital benefit interaction design. We ground texture in case study of the Icehotel, a spectacular frozen edifice. The site demonstrates how a mundane material can be re-imagined as precious and novel. By focusing on the texture of ice, designers craft its extension into the realm of computational materiality. Tracing this process of aligning the physical and digital via the material and social construction of textures speaks back to the broader field of interaction design. It demonstrates how the process of crafting alliances between new and old materials requires both taking seriously the materialities of both, and then organizing their relation in terms of commonalities rather than differences. The result is a way of speaking about computational materials through a more textured lens.

In this article, we explore a concept-driven approach to interaction design research with a specific focus on theoretical advancements. We introduce this approach as a complementary approach to more traditional, and well-known, user-centered interaction design approaches. A concept-driven approach aims at manifesting theoretical concepts in concrete designs. A good concept design is both conceptually and historically grounded, bearing signs of the intended theoretical considerations. In the area of human–computer interaction and interaction design research, this approach has been quite popular but not necessarily explicitly recognized and developed as a proper research methodology. In this article, we demonstrate how a concept-driven approach can coexist, and be integrated with, common user-centered approaches to interaction design through the development of a model that makes explicit the existing cycle of prototyping, theory development, and user studies. We also present a set of basic principles that could constitute a foundation for concept driven interaction research, and we have considered and described the methodological implications given these principles. For the field of interaction design research we find this as an important point of departure for taking the next step toward the construction and verification of theoretical constructs that can help inform and guide future design research projects on novel interaction technologies.

Traditionally, media objects have been restrained to specific media containers (e.g. media players, libraries, and technological platforms). In this paper we argue that this is due to a tradition of treating media as content separated from, but physically aligned to a certain form. However, due to the digital character of modern media, and due to current developments towards file sharing communities, media convergence and cross-media interaction design we argue that there are several good reasons now for exploring the design space beyond a container view of media. In our exploration of this design space we take a point of departure in media objects where form and content is integrated, instead of separated and we take contemporary theories of liquidity and an innovation-oriented focus group study as two sources of inspiration for exploring the design space of truly liquid media. The exploration is then summarized into a vision of midget design, i.e. design of small, lightweight, interactive and integrated media objects that can live across heterogeneous media platforms.

With the current development towards completely interactive environments realized through ubiquitous computing technologies and new transmaterials, the interaction landscape is changing from consisting of separated computer environments and related human-computer interaction issues, to being more about interactive architecture and human- (digitally enhanced) environment interaction. Given this general shift it becomes important to examine the fundamental challenges, consequences, and implications for design facing interaction designers. In this paper we therefore set out to: 1) describe the general character of these future interactive environments, 2) discuss interaction design challenges related to fully interactive environments, and 3) point at some general implications for design given this new understanding. To exemplify this trend, we describe two ongoing research projects that illustrate some aspects of the changes of the physical environment and changes in the (traditional) relation between the physical environment and its habitants. Finally, we present some arguments for environment interaction theorizing as a fundamental approach to tackle this general and fundamental challenge for the field of human-computer interaction.

In this paper we present a longitudinal study of an online media space addressing the question of how availability is managed in an interaction-intensive organization. We relied on three different data collection techniques and analysed our data in relation to three different work modes. During this study we participated in an online media space, for approximately six months making spot checks and observing the population from which ten subjects were selected for interviews. Our results show how techniques and strategies for availability management are developed and continuously adapted to a shared common ground. Further, our results show how having the communication channel open, and regulating availability on a social level instead of on a solely technical level, has the advantage of better coping with the ever-changing dynamics in group works. Finally, we show that there exists an ambiguity of availability cues in online media spaces that is smoothly handled by individuals.

Previous research in computer games have focused on user experience from the perspectives of game content, graphics, interactivity and underling game story while missing to address the effect of a certain input modality on the user experience. In this paper we report from two user studies that focus on players' experience and performance in relation to the use of two different input modalities for the same game and whether it changes the flow and gameplay in any way. The overall research was according to this whether a game can be more fun to play with a certain input modality? The paper presents the results from these studies and draws conclusions based on these data in relation to computer games and user experiences in the context of mobile game playing.

Interruptions are a central aspect of working life. The prevalence of remote co-workers and the use of mobile technology mean that interruptions are more prevalent, and workers have to learn to manage availability. To understand general issues in availability management, we carried out a naturalistic study of how interruptions are handled in face-to-face situations. We found that availability management requires negotiation, that it is also highly dependent on awareness about the availability of others, and that it demands cognitive effort to shift attention to the interruption. On the basis of these observations, we developed a technology, named. The Negotiator, that embodies three main design requirements: (a) support for negotiation, (b) contextual information about when a recipient is available for a call, (c) lightweightness to reduce attention overhead. We carried out an experimental study of interruption management using this technology. The interface satisfied the original design requirements, that is, people, were able to use it effectively to negotiate times to talk, while successfully carrying out an intellectually demanding activity. Contrary to our expectations, however, people preferred to take responsibility for returning calls rather than delegating them, and they preferred to schedule calls as soon as possible rather than deferring them. We suggest that there are social reasons why people do this. They feel a social obligation to return calls as soon as possible so as not to inconvenience others and also to be responsible for making these calls themselves. They also take calls sooner to avoid having to remember future conversational commitments. We discuss the theoretical and technical implications of these findings.

This paper reports the final step of a research project that has aimed at developing novel meeting support for mobile CSCW (Computer Supported Cooperative Work). The underlying idea was to integrate spontaneous mobile meetings with in between meeting support, and divide the use between different situations rather than users attention. We propose a novel integrated architecture called RoamWare that illustrates the concepts of divided use, invisible computer support, and seamless ongoing interaction across physical and virtual meetings. We then report on some initial use results and relate it to other research attempts near us before concluding the paper.