Walking: A Grounded Theory of Social Engagement and Experience

Stavros Asimakopoulos1 and Alan Dix2

1Academy for Digital Entertainment, NHTV Breda University of Applied Sciences, The Netherlands
2HCI Centre, University of Birmingham, UK

Interacting with Computers.

Although growing numbers of researchers are studying the role of social engagement in ubiquitous technologies and applications, few frameworks have been proposed that attend to the lived experience of the individual and social dynamic within which it is intimately enmeshed. We present empirical insights using grounded theory from data gathered during a 102-day walk of the second author around Wales. This study inductively developed a substantive social engagement framework of the Walking experience that appears to be simple and flexible. The main aim of this paper is to present the developed framework, where even apparently 'solitary' walking is set within a rich technical and social matrix. The primary characteristics of this framework, namely accuracy of social judgements, accountability of decisions and actions, enhancing self-esteem, and satisfying intrinsic motivation goals, are in line with social user experience and show promise of being useful in ubiquitous technologies, regardless of user activity.

Keywords: field studies; social navigation; grounded theory; walking experience; user experience; social engagement

Bibliography

  1. Adams, A., Lunt, P. and Cairns, P. (2008) A Qualitative Approach to HCI Research. In Cairns, P. and Cox, A. (eds), Research Methods for Human-Computer Interaction. pp. 138–157. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.
  2. Aoki, M.P., Grinter, E.R., Hurst, A., Szymanski, H.M., Thornton, D.J. and Woodruff, A. (2002). Sotto voce: Exploring the interplay of conversation and mobile audio spaces. In Proc. SIGCHI Conf. Human Factors in Computing Systems, pp. 431–438. ACM, New York, NY.
  3. Asimakopoulos, S., Asimakopoulos, G. and Spillers, F. (2017) Motivation and user engagement in fitness tracking: heuristics for mobile healthcare wearables. Informatics – Special Issue Smart Health, 4, 5.
  4. Augoustinos, M. (2001) Social Categorisation: Toward Theoretical Integration. In Deaux, K. and Philogene, G. (eds), Representations of the Social. pp. 201–216. Blackwell Publishers, Oxford.
  5. Battarbee, K. (2007) Co-experience: product experience as social interaction. In Schifferstein, H.N.J. and Hekkert, P. (eds), Product Experience. pp. 461–476. Elsevier, Amsterdam.
  6. Benford, S. and Giannachi, G. (2008). Temporal trajectories in shared interactive narratives. In Proc. SIGCHI Conf. Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '08), pp. 73–82. ACM, New York, NY, USA. doi:10.1145/1357054.1357067.
  7. Berkovich, M., Date, J., Keeler, R., Louw, M. and O'Toole, M. (2003). Discovery point: enhancing the museum experience with technology. In Extended Abstracts of the SIGCHI conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pp. 994–995. ACM, New York, NY.
  8. Berman, M.G., Jonides, J. and Kaplan, S. (2008) The cognitive benefits of interacting with nature. Psychol. Sci., 19, 1207–1212.
  9. Bessiere, K., Seay, F. and Kiesler, S. (2007) The ideal elf: identity exploration in World of Warcraft. Cyberpsychol. Behav., 10, 530–535.
  10. Bidwell, N. and Browning, D. (2006). Making there: methods to uncover egocentric experience in a dialogic of natural places. In Kjeldskov, J. and Paay, J. (eds.) Proc. 18th Australia Conf. Computer Human Interaction: Design: Activities, Artefacts and Environments (OZCHI '06), pp. 229–236. ACM, New York, NY, USA. doi:10.1145/1228175.1228216.
  11. Bidwell, N., Siya, M., Marsden, G., Tucker, W., Tshemese, M., Gaven, N., Ntlangano, S., Eglinton, K.A. and Robinson, S. (2013) Walking and the Social Life of Solar Charging in Rural Africa. ACM Trans. Comput. Hum. Interact., 20, 22:1–22:33.
  12. Birks, M. and Mills, J. (2011) Grounded Theory: A Practical Guide. SAGE, Thousand Oaks, CA.
  13. Bratman, N.G., Daily, C.G., Levy, J.B. and Gross, G.G. (2015) The benefits of nature experience: Improved affect and cognition. Landsc. Urban. Plan., 138, 41–50.
  14. Brewer, M.B. and Gardner, W. (1996) Who is this 'we'? Levels of collective identity and self representations. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol., 71, 83–93.
  15. Buchenau, M. and Fulton, S. (2000). Experience prototyping. In Proc. Designing Information Systems, DIS'00, pp. 424–433. ACM, New York, NY, USA.
  16. Button, G. (ed.), (1993) Technology in Working Order. Routledge, London.
  17. Carroll, J.M. (2012) The Neighborhood and the Internet: Design Research Projects in Community Informatics. Advances in Sociology. Routledge, NewYork, NY.
  18. Castano, E. (2004) In case of death, cling to the ingroup. Eur. J. Soc. Psychol., 384, 375–384.
  19. Castano, E., Yzerbyt, V., Paladino, M.P. and Sacchi, S. (2002) I belong, therefore, I exist: Ingroup identification, ingroup entitativity, and ingroup bias. Pers. Soc. Psychol. Bull., 28, 135–143.
  20. Checkland, P. (1981/1998) Systems Thinking, Systems Practice. John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
  21. Chen, S., Boucher, H.C. and Tapias, M.P. (2006) The relational self revealed: Integrative conceptualization and implications for interpersonal life. Psychol. Bull., 132, 151–179.
  22. Cheverst, K., Davies, N., Mitchell, K., Friday, A. and Efstratiou, C. (2000). Developing a context-aware electronic tourist guide: some issues and experiences. In Proc. SIGCHI Conf. Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '00), pp. 17–24. ACM, New York, NY, USA. doi:10.1145/332040.332047.
  23. Churchill, E.F. (2008). Maps and moralities, blanks and beasties. ACM Interactions, July/August, 40–43.
  24. Churchill, E.F. (2010). Today's Flaneur: From HCI to place-based interaction and human-place interaction. ACM Interations, July/ August, 62–66.
  25. Corbin, J.M. and Strauss, A.C. (2008) Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory (3rd edn). SAGE, Thousand Oaks, CA.
  26. Curmi, F., Ferrario, M.A. and Whittle, J. (2017) Biometric data sharing in the wild: investigating the effects on online sports spectators. Int. J. Hum. Comput. Stud., 105, 56–67. doi:10.1016/j. ijhcs.2017.03.008.
  27. Curmi, F., Ferrario, M., Southern, J. and Whittle, J. (2013). HeartLink: open broadcast of live biometric data to social networks. In Proc. SIGCHI Conf. Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '13), pp. 1749–58. ACM, New York, NY, USA. doi:10.1145/2470654.2466231.
  28. Descartes, R. (1637). A Discourse on Method. Project Gutenberg EBook, dated 2008. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/59/59-h/59-h.htm#part4 (accessed November 27, 2013).
  29. Dix, A. (1995) Cooperation without (reliable) communication: interfaces for mobile applications. Distrib. Syst. Eng., 2, 171–181. http://www.hcibook.com/alan/papers/DSE95/.
  30. Dix., A. (2010) Human-Computer Interaction: a stable discipline, a nascent science, and the growth of the long tail. Interact. Comput., 22, 13–27.
  31. Dix, A. (2013). The Walk: exploring the technical and social margins. Keynote APCHI 2013/India HCI 2013, Bangalore India, 27th September, p. 7. http://www.hcibook.com/alan/talks/ APCHI-2013/.
  32. Dix, A. (2017) Step by Step Research. In Chamberlain, A. and Crabtree, A. (eds), Research in the Wild: Exploring Ethnography, Ethics, Science and Design. Springer, (Chapter in press).
  33. Dix, A. and Gongora, L. (2011). Externalisation and Design. DESIRE 2011 2nd Int. Conf. Creativity and Innovation in Design. pp. 31–42.
  34. Dix, A. and Phillips, P. (2006). SlowTime – LifeChimes. Art Works, Proc. 1st Int. Symp. Culture, Creativity and Interaction Design, CCID 2006. LeonardoNet Network. p. 53.
  35. Dix, A., Rodden, T., Davies, N., Trevor, J., Friday, A. and Palfreyman, K. (2000) Exploiting space and location as a design framework for interactive mobile systems. ACM Trans. Comput. Hum. Interact., 7, 285–321. doi:10.1145/355324.355325.
  36. Dostal, J. and Dix, A. (2011) Tiree Tech Wave. Interfaces, Summer 2011, pp. 16–17. http://tireetechwave.org/events/ttw-1/interfaces-article/.
  37. Dunne, Á., Lawlor, M.A. and Rowley, J. (2010) Young people's use of online social networking sites–a uses and gratifications perspective. J. Res. Interact. Market., 4, 46–58.
  38. Garfinkel, H. (1984) Studies in Ethnomethodology. Polity Press/ Blackwell Publishers, Oxford, UK, [First published in America, 1967].
  39. Gergen, K.J. (2000) The Saturated Self (2nd edn). Perseus, New York, NY.
  40. Glaser, B.G. (1978) Theoretical Sensitivity: Advances in the Methodology of Grounded Theory. The Sociology Press, Mill Valley, CA.
  41. Glaser, B.G. (1992) Basics of grounded theory analysis Emergence vs. forcing. Sociology Press, California, CA.
  42. Glaser, B.G. (1998) Doing Grounded Theory: Issues and Discussions. Sociology Press, Mill Valley, CA.
  43. Glaser, B.G. (2005) The Grounded Theory Perspective III: Theoretical Coding. Sociology Press, Mill Valley, CA.
  44. Glaser, B.G. and Strauss, A. (1967) The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for Qualitative Research. Aldine Publishing Co, Chicago, IL.
  45. Guadagno, R.E., Muscanell, N.L., Okdie, B.M., Burk, N.M. and Ward, T.B. (2011) Even in virtual environments women shop and men build: a social role perspective on Second Life. Comput. Human. Behav., 27, 304–308.
  46. Han, K., Shih, C.P., Rosson, B.M. and Carroll, M.J. (2014) Understanding local community attachment, engagement and social support networks mediated by mobile technology. Interact. Comput., November, 28, 220–237. doi:10.1093/iwc/iwu040.
  47. Harmon, E. (2015). Computing as Context: Dis/Connection Beyond the Moment of Non/Use. Ph.D. Dissertation, University Of California, Irvine.
  48. Harmon, E. (2017) 'My Maps, My Music, My Everything': Smartphones, Technology, and Ways to 'Take a Break from this Life' on the Pacific Crest Trail. Talk at Technolgy on the Tail workshop, Virginia Tech, March 2nd. Available online at https://technologyonthetrail.wordpress.com/workshop/talks/.
  49. Heath, C. and von Lehn, D. (2004) Configuring reception: (Dis-) regarding the 'spectator' in museums and galleries. Theor. Cult. Soc., 21, 43–65.
  50. Heath, C. and Luff, P. (1991). Collaborative activity and technological design: Task coordination in London Underground control rooms. Proc. 2nd European Conf. Computer Supported Cooperative Work, 65–80.
  51. Hoda, R., Noble, J. and Marshall, S. (2010). Using grounded theory to study the human aspects of software engineering. In Proc. Human Aspects of Software Engineering, pp. 1–2. ACM.
  52. Honoré, C. (2004) Praise of Slow. HarperSanFrancisco, ISBN 006054578X.
  53. Ingold, T. (2007) Lines: A Brief History. Routledge, ISBN: 0415424267.
  54. Karapanos, E., Teixeira, P. and Gouveia, R. (2016) Need fulfillment and experiences on social media: A case on Facebook an WhatsApp. Comput. Human. Behav., 55, 888–897.
  55. Kaur, P., Dhir, A., Chen, S. and Rajala, R. (2016) Flow in context: development and validation of the flow experience instrument for social networking. Comput. Human. Behav., 59, 358e–367e.
  56. Khalid, H. and Dix, A. (2010) The experience of photologging: global mechanisms and local interactions. Pers. Ubiquit. Comput., 14, 209–226.
  57. Kortuem, G., Schneider, J., Preuitt, D., Thompson, T., Fickas, S. and Segall, Z. (2001). When peer-to-peer comes face-to-face: Collaborative peer-to-peer computing in mobile ad-hoc networks. 1st Int. Conf. Peer-to-Peer Computing, 2001. IEEE, pp.75–91.
  58. Kostakos, V., O'Neill, E., Penn, A., Roussos, G. and Papadongonas, D. (2010) Brief encounters: Sensing, modeling and visualizing urban mobility and copresence networks. ACM Trans. Comput. Hum. Interact., 17, 38.
  59. Mason, R., Suner, S. and Williams, K. (2013) An analysis of hiker preparedness: a survey of hiker habits in New Hampshire. Wilderness. Environ. Med., 24, 221–227. doi:10.1016/j.wem. 2013.02.002.
  60. Massung, E., Coyle, D., Cater, K.F., Jay, M. and Preist, C. (2013). Using crowdsourcing to support pro-environmental community activism. In Proc. CHI 2013, pp. 371–380. ACM.
  61. McCarthy, J. and Wright, P. (2004) Technology as Experience. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, ISBN 0-262-13447-0.
  62. Mentis, M.H., Laaksolahti, J. and Hook, K. (2014) My self and you: tension in bodily sharing of experience. ACM Trans. Comput. Hum. Interact., 21(4):20. doi:10.1145/2617945.
  63. Monroy-Hernández, A., Farnham, S., Kiciman, E., Counts, S. and De Choudhury, M. (2013) Smart societies: from citizens as sensors to collective action. Interactions, 20, 16–19.
  64. Morgan, A., Dix, A., Philips, M. and House, C. (2014) Blue sky thinking meets green field usability: can mobile internet software engineering bridge the rural divide? Local Econ., 29, 750–761.
  65. Moscovici, S. (1988) Notes towards a description of social representations. Eur. J. Soc. Psychol., 18, 211–250.
  66. Parker, A., Kantroo, V., Lee, H.R., Osornio, M., Sharma, M. and Grinter, R. (2012). Health promotion as activism: building community capacity to effect social change. In Proc CHI 2012, pp. 99–108. ACM.
  67. Pentland, A., Fletcher, R. and Hasson, A. (2004) DakNet: rethinking connectivity in developing nations. IEEE Comput., 37, 78–83.
  68. Posti, M., Schöning, J. and Häkkilä, J. (2014). Unexpected journeys with the HOBBIT: the design and evaluation of an asocial hiking app. In Proc. 2014 Conf. Designing interactive systems (DIS '14), pp. 637–646. ACM, New York, NY, USA.
  69. Pribeanu, C., Limbourg, Q. and Vanderdonckt, J. (2001) Task Modelling for Context-Sensitive User Interfaces. In Johnson, C. (ed.), Interactive Systems: Design, Specification, and Verification. pp. 49–68. Springer, doi:10.1007/3-540-45522-1_4. LNCS 2220.
  70. Razak, F. (2008). Single Person Study: Methodological Issues, PhD Thesis. Computing Department, Lancaster University, UK. http://www.hcibook.net/people/Fariza/.
  71. Rogers, Y. (2004) New theoretical approaches for HCI. Ann. Rev. Info. Sci. Technol., 38, 87–143.
  72. Ruddle, R.A., Volkova, E. and Bulthoff, H.H. (2011) Walking improves your cognitive map in environments that are largescale and large in extent. ACM Trans. Comput. Hum. Interact., 18, 20.
  73. Sanders, E.B.-N. (2001). Virtuosos of the experience domain. Proc. 2001 IDSA Education Conf. Retrieved 5 September from http:// www.maketools.com.
  74. Seth, A., Kroeker, D., Zaharia, M., Guo, S. and Keshav, S. (2006). Low-cost communication for rural internet kiosks using mechanical backhaul. In Proc. ACM MobiCom, pp. 334–345.
  75. Solnit, R. (2001) Wanderlust. Verso, ISBN: 1844675580.
  76. Spillers, F. and Asimakopoulos, S. (2014) Does Social User Experience Improve Motivation for Runners? In Marcus, A. (ed.), Design, User Experience, and Usability. User Experience Design Practice. pp. 358–369. Springer, LNCS 8520.
  77. Stanton Fraser, D., Jay, T., Eamonn O'Neill, E. and Penn, A. (2013) My neighbourhood: Studying perceptions of urban space and neighbourhood with moblogging. Pervasive Mob. Comput., 9, 722–737. doi:10.1016/j.pmcj.2012.07.002.
  78. Stern, P.N. (1994) Eroding Grounded Theory. In Morse, J.M. (ed.), Critical Issues in Qualitative Research Methods. pp. 210–223. SAGE, Thousands Oaks, CA.
  79. Strauss, A.C. and Corbin, J.M. (1990) Basics of Qualitative Research: Grounded Theory Procedures and Techniques (2nd edn). SAGE, Thousand Oaks, CA.
  80. Strauss, A.C. and Corbin, J.M. (1997) Grounded Theory in Practice. Sage Publications, London.
  81. Tajfel, H. and Turner, J.C. (1979) An integrative theory of intergroup conflict. In Worchel, S. and Austin, W.G. (eds), The Social Psychology of Intergroup Relations. pp. 33–47. Brooks-Cole, Monterey.
  82. Terveen, L. and McDonald, W.D. (2005) Social matching: a framework and research agenda. ACM Trans. Comput. Hum. Interact., 12, 401–434.
  83. Tiree Tech Wave. http://tireetechwave.org/ (accessed November 27, 2013).
  84. UWTSD (2013) Walking Around Wales: An Exhibition to Coincide with the Visit of Professor Alan Dix to the Roderic Bowen Library and Archives, June 2013. University of Wales Trinity St David. http://www.uwtsd.ac.uk/rbla/online-exhibitions/walkingaround-wales/.
  85. Weisser, M. (1991) The Computer for the Twenty-first Century. pp. 94–104. Scientific American.
  86. Wulf, V., Aal, K., Ktesh, I.A., Atam, M., Schubert, K., Rohde, M., Yerousis, G.P. and Randall, D. (2013). Fighting against the wall: social media use by political activists in a palestinian village. In Proc CHI 2013, pp. 1979–88. ACM.
  87. Zhang, H., Lu, Y., Gupta, S. and Zhao, L. (2014) What motivates customers to participate in social commerce? the impact of technological environments and virtual customer experiences. Info. Manag., 51, 1017e1030.

Figure 1. Walker/participant-researcher roles and research process.

 

Figure 4. Spheres of social connections and technology use.

 

 


http://www.hcibook.com/alan/papers/IwC-walking-2017/

Alan Dix 30/8/2017