Capturing people’s spontaneous thoughts or daily emotions in their everyday living space can be difficult and can pose a psychological burden from a clinical standpoint. To address this issue, we have developed EmotionFrame, which allows users to archive their daily experiences by recording videos of their current thoughts and emotions at home. EmotionFrame serves as a journaling device, and the parameters for journaling have been determined based on a depression assessment model. This study explores the benefits of users’ recording feelings about their daily events, which can also help with assessing depressive mood with the journaling data. Our three-week in-field study with eight participants showed that EmotionFrame could be integrated into participants’ daily routines based on their previous diary-writing habits. In addition, its harmonious frame shape fits in with the everyday environment. Being able to engage in spontaneous journaling in private spaces – and in a way that allowed them to see themselves – prompted the study participants to effectively record their sincere thoughts and emotions during the archiving process.

The remote communication within intimate groups can be challenging due to lack of or excessive of non-verbal messages, which lack physicality. In this paper, we introduce Stubbi, a device designed to enhance remote text and voice communication in small intimate groups by enabling the exchange of simple physical movements. Each group member is equipped with Stubbi, which consists of three stubs that represent each person and enable the expression of physical movements through height changes and rotation. Our in-lab study involving six groups of three friends revealed that Stubbi effectively maintained the flow of IM conversations by increasing attentiveness and responsiveness. Additionally, in group voice calls, the exchange of personified messages through physical movements of the stubs assisted group interactions, such as turn-taking. Our findings suggest faurther implications for designing interactive systems that can support improved remote communication by seamlessly connecting IM and voice call conversations for small intimate groups.

Although audiobooks are increasingly being used, people tend to perceive audiobook experiences as 'not real reading' due to its intangibility and ephemerality. In this paper, we developed ADIO, a device augmenting audiobook experience through representing personal listening state in the form of an interactive physical bookshelf. ADIO displays a user's listening progress through a pendant's changing length and the user's digital audiobook archive titles. The result of our four-week in-field study with six participants revealed that ADIO provided proof of the user's listening-to, which brought a sense of reading and gave a trigger for recalling the listened-to audiobook content. Additionally, audiobooks' improved visibility reminded participants to listen to them, and ADIO's physical interaction allowed participants to form personal patterns for listening to audiobooks. Our findings proposed new methods for augmenting the audiobook listening experience at three stages and further implications for designing physical curation on users’ digital archives.

We introduce DayClo, an interactive clock visualizing schedule data for supporting users to reflect and self-track themselves in their daily lives. DayClo is designed by applying the form and time representation method of analog clocks. It shows the user's upcoming schedules through the sequential movement of two clock hands with hidden LEDs and a display. We deployed DayClo in eight participants' working spaces for a month to explore how the design and its interaction could support their reflections on their scheduling practices. The findings revealed that DayClo supported users' casual access to the schedule data and motivated self-tracking of their plans. Moreover, the moving clock hands revealed the empty time of their schedules and helped to draw new plans for their implicit goal. Our findings suggest new opportunities for designing everyday objects as a medium of delivering and fostering spontaneous interaction with personal data for self-reflection.

We introduce Bookly, an interactive artifact that physically represents the accumulated time of users' reading activity through abstract volumetric changes. Bookly accumulates the time of actions (e.g., picking up and putting down books) that users performed for reading and provides a designated space for the ongoing book being read. The results of our 2-week in-field study with six participants showed that continuous exposure to volumetric changes representing the accumulated time of reading activities helped the users to understand their unsettled reading patterns. Bookly also motivated the users to improve their reading behavior by gradually making reading part of their schedules. Additionally, the definite distinction of the ongoing book improved its visual affordance and accessibility for the users to start reading books. Based on the findings, we confirmed the possibility of making intangible data physical for self-reflection to enhance changes in behaviors that are difficult to perform due to weak motivation.

We introduce Quietto: an interactive timepiece made of molded concrete and milled wood. It shows upcoming daily schedules and the time through the quiet, ambient motions of a clock hand and light through the concrete touch interface. The results of an in-field user observation of 10 participants over 3 days showed the possibilities of using concrete as a unique and attractive material for designing a tangible interface due to its unexpected haptic feeling. We also found that Quietto provides an intuitive and effective representation of its users' daily schedules and can be used as a private, personal device. Through its distinctive design, Quietto can provide a new way of understanding scheduling through its concrete texture and amusing interaction qualities.