UXD740 – Week 2: Exploring HCI

7th October 2021

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We are in a world where we are fixated on technology, such as our phones, desktops, gaming devices and many more creative devices. Amber Case talks about the reality that humans are cyborgs. Our culture has become one that involves “Clicking on things and staring at screens." There has been speculation and concerns that one day fast-growing technologies will take over humans and the world. I am imagining the Irobot movie or The Matrix where there is a war between humans and evil machine robots and we must stop them from taking over humanity. Hopefully, it will never come to that scenario.

However, Case makes a valid point “It’s not that machines are taking over. It’s that they’re helping us to be more human, helping us to connect with each other” (Case, A. 2010). Without technology, we are unable to do the simple things in life. For example, being able to contact our family and friends with a few touches on a mobile phone or watching the news on television. These simple things assist us in the things we need to do. It’s quicker and efficient instead of writing a letter and waiting for days or weeks for a response.

It is important to see technology positively and use it to improve and empower our lives and the world.

Technologies

Image: Milgram and Kishino's reality-virtuality continuum

The reality virtuality continuum is a mixed reality founded by Milgram and Kishino. Their framework shows virtual reality is on one end and reality on the opposite end (Skarbez et al, 2021). The space between the two is the creation of exciting technologies that assist us in everyday tasks and great experiences.

Augmented reality (AR) is where digital information is presented or overlaid in the physical world (Anthes, 2019). Examples include Pokemon Go and the Ikea furniture shopping app. According to Anthes article, the AR market will grow at an annual rate of 75% by 2024. It has already grown significantly in the retail, automotive and medical industries and you can access them on tablet and smartphone devices.

Virtual reality (VR) is where the user is interacting with a new world entirely and is associated with headsets or other wearables. It has become the most immersive form of human-computer interaction and is still being developed today. Examples include games, education, virtual tours in interior design and museums and healthcare.

Challenge activity part 2

One of my main struggles with this project was to be specific and concise about the topic I was researching. I have been going back and forth on the research question and I still was not being distinctive enough.

My core interest is to become a UI/UX designer at the end of the Masters. For this module, my ideas and topics are broad and I have been open to researching multiple subjects.

I researched augmented reality in online shopping and found many papers and materials on this topic. However, I struggled to find a specific and interesting research question that was unique. Although this is a very innovative topic, there were many developing technologies in AR already. I wanted to choose something more interesting to me. The tutors had advised me to be clear, concise and choose a topic I was passionate about.

I decided to revert to my original idea of sleep therapy apps and insomnia. This is a topic that hasn’t been widely talked about but it is linked with health and wellbeing which has become a prominent issue in society today.

Why is the problem you are addressing important?

• Health and wellbeing have become an important topic ever since the global COVID-19 pandemic hit us in 2019. A specific topic within health and wellbeing is sleep and insomnia.

• Many people suffer from sleep deficiencies or mild to serious insomnia cases and this affects your overall wellbeing and day to day performance and tasks.

• Especially with the pandemic, it has hit some people harder, people who have mental illnesses have issues with their sleeping patterns.

What is lacking in the current knowledge?

• Whether self-management sleep therapy apps are effective?

• Can sleep therapy apps improve sleeping patterns?

• Can they help to treat insomnia?

• Are they better than face-to-face cognitive behavioural therapy?

What are the objectives of your study or the research question?

• To research sleep therapy apps like Sleep Cycle and Eyeshut and what functionalities they have to support better sleep

• A survey asking users about their current sleep habits and whether they use apps e.g. how many hours do you sleep? how many hours would you like to sleep? Do you have trouble sleeping? To identify issues of sleep and possibilities of why they may have insomnia?

• Test an app with a small group of users to get an understanding if it works for them and whether they can incorporate it in their daily lives - Due to time limitations I won’t be able to go through all apps so choosing one specifically for this research will be feasible.

Researching keywords: Cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia, Insomnia, Self-management sleep therapy apps, pandemic insomnia.

Research problem:

There are many people who suffer from insomnia or experience sleep deficiency and use self-management sleep therapy applications via mobile to relieve symptoms and to improve their sleep. However, there is very little research on how effective they are and whether they can improve their sleep. Cognitive behavioural therapy sessions have research and evidence on how effective they are. Is this better than self-management apps?

Research question:

In what ways does sleep self-management apps like Sleep Cycle, improve insomnia compared to face-to-face cognitive behavioural sleep therapy?

References

CASE, Amber. (2010). We are all Cyborgs Now [online video]. Available at: https://www.ted.com/talks/amber_case_we_are_all_cyborgs_now/transcript?language=en

ANTHES, Gary. 2019. ‘Augmented Reality Gets Real’. Communications of the ACM 62(9), 16–8.

Parker, A. 2021. Mixed reality - part 1. [image] Available at: <https://flex.falmouth.ac.uk/courses/910/pages/week-2-technologies?module_item_id=54651> [Accessed 7 October 2021].

RICHARD SKARBEZ, MISSIE SMITH and MARY C. WHITTON. 2021. ‘Revisiting Milgram and Kishino’s Reality-Virtuality Continuum’. Frontiers in Virtual Reality 2.

PIGEON, Wilfred R. 2010. ‘Treatment of Adult Insomnia with Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy’. Journal of Clinical Psychology 66(11), 1148–60.

Images

2020. Augmented reality map in tablet. [image] Available at: <hhttps://unsplash.com/photos/CyX3ZAti5DA> [Accessed 7 October 2021].