This paper describes the challenges and lessons learned in the experience-centered design (ECD) of the Spheres of Wellbeing, a technology to promote the mental health and wellbeing of a group of women, suffering from significant mental health problems and living in a medium secure hospital unit. First, we describe how our relationship with mental health professionals at the hospital and the aspirations for person-centric care that we shared with them enabled us, in the design of the Spheres, to innovate outside traditional healthcare procedures. We then provide insights into the challenges presented by the particular care culture and existing services and practices in the secure hospital unit that were revealed through our technology deployment. In discussing these challenges, our design enquiry opens up a space to make sense of experience living with complex mental health conditions in highly constrained contexts within which the deployment of the Spheres becomes an opportunity to think about wellbeing in similar contexts.

Online and digital technologies support and extend the action repertoires of localized social movements. In this paper we examine the ways by which digital technologies can support "on-the-ground" activist communities in the development of social movements. After identifying some of the challenges of deploying conventional voting and consultation technologies for activism, we examine situated political action in local communities through the design and deployment of a low-cost community voting prototype, PosterVote. We deploy PosterVote in two case studies with two local community organizations identifying the features that supported or hindered grassroots democratic practices. Through interviews with these communities, we explore the design of situated voting systems to support participation within an ecology of social action.

We present a novel approach to graspable interfaces using Touchbugs, actuated physical objects for interacting with interactive surface computing applications. Touchbugs are active tangibles that are able to move across surfaces by employing vibrating motors and can communicate with camera based multi-touch surfaces using infrared LEDs. Touchbug's embedded inertial sensors and computational capabilities open a new interaction space by providing autonomous capabilities for tangibles that allow goal directed behavior.

The Break-Time Barometer is a social awareness system, which was developed as part of an exploratory study of the use of situated sensing and displays to promote cohesion in a newly-dispersed workplace. The Break-Time Barometer specifically aims to use an ambient persuasion approach in order to encourage people to join existing breaks, which take place within this community. Drawing upon a privacy-sensitive ubiquitous sensing infrastructure, the system of-fers information about potentially break-related activity in social spaces within this workplace, including alerts when specific events are detected. The system was developed using a user-centered iterative design approach. A qualitative mixed methods evaluation of a full deployment identified a diverse set of reactions to both the system and the design goal, and further elaborated the challenges of designing for social connectedness in this complex workplace context.

We describe the development, application and evaluation of a design method tailored for working with people with mild to moderate dementia. Our experiences with the approach highlighted areas where designers and participants held radically different views. The tenet of our approach was that to overcome these differences we needed to create an empathic relationship between participants and designers. To achieve this we modified participatory design techniques to foster respectful engagement with participants in the development of a digital aid to facilitate "safe walking". The process begins with broad qualitative scoping and design work then moves to developing personally tailored, individual designs to further exploration of the experiential elements of the domain while reducing the need for the participants to engage in abstract thought. Reflection highlights a number of important areas that demand consideration when undertaking research in this area and, more generally, when performing design work with people with dementia.

Ubiquitous computing technologies have traditionally striven to augment objects and the environment with sensing capabilities to enable them to respond appropriately to the needs of the individuals in the environment. This paper considers how such technologies might be harnessed to support language learning, and specifically Task-Based Learning (TBL). Task-Based Learning (TBL) involves doing meaningful tasks in a foreign language, emphasising the language's use in practice. TBL is seen as a highly engaging and motivating approach to learning a language, but is difficult to do in the classroom. Here, learners typically engage in activities that only simulate 'real-world' tasks, and as such only rehearse language use, rather than applying the language in practice. In this paper, we explore how an instrumented, context-aware environment whose design is grounded in pedagogical principles can support TBL. We present the French Kitchen, an instrumented kitchen for English speakers who are learning French, and describe a 46-participant evaluation of the kitchen. Based on the evaluation, we provide a set of design recommendations for those building instrumented systems for TBL.

We present the development of a socially acceptable cueing device for drooling in Parkinson's disease (PD). Sialorrhea, or drooling, is a significant problem associated with PD and has a strong negative emotional impact on those who experience it. Previous studies have shown the potential for managing drooling by using a cueing device. However, the devices used in these studies were deemed unacceptable by their users due to factors such as hearing impairment and social embarrassment. We conducted exploratory scoping work and high fidelity iterative prototyping with people with PD to get their input on the design of a cueing aid and this has given us an insight into challenges that confront users with PD and limit device usability and acceptability. The key finding from working with people with PD was the need for the device to be socially acceptable.