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HeartChat: Heart Rate Augmented Mobile Chat to Support Empathy and Awareness

Published: 02 May 2017 Publication History

Abstract

Textual communication via mobile phones suffers from a lack of context and emotional awareness. We present a mobile chat application, HeartChat, which integrates heart rate as a cue to increase awareness and empathy. Through a literature review and a focus group, we identified design dimensions important for heart rate augmented chats. We created three concepts showing heart rate per message, in real-time, or sending it explicitly. We tested our system in a two week in-the-wild study with 14 participants (7 pairs). Interviews and questionnaires showed that HeartChat supports empathy between people, in particular close friends and partners. Sharing heart rate helped them to implicitly understand each other's context (e.g. location, physical activity) and emotional state, and sparked curiosity on special occasions. We discuss opportunities, challenges, and design implications for enriching mobile chats with physiological sensing.

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    cover image ACM Conferences
    CHI '17: Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
    May 2017
    7138 pages
    ISBN:9781450346559
    DOI:10.1145/3025453
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    Published: 02 May 2017

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    Author Tags

    1. affective computing
    2. heart rate
    3. instant messagingg
    4. physiological sensing

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    • (2024)iFace: Hand-Over-Face Gesture Recognition Leveraging Impedance SensingProceedings of the Augmented Humans International Conference 202410.1145/3652920.3652923(131-137)Online publication date: 4-Apr-2024
    • (2024)EmpathiCH: Scrutinizing Empathy-Centric Design Beyond the IndividualExtended Abstracts of the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613905.3636297(1-7)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
    • (2024)Investigating the Effects of Real-time Student Monitoring Interface on Instructors’ Monitoring Practices in Online TeachingProceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3642845(1-11)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
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    • (2024)Augmenting the Sense of Social Presence in Online Video Games Through the Sharing of BiosignalsIEEE Access10.1109/ACCESS.2024.342924712(98977-98989)Online publication date: 2024
    • (2024)I'm Not Upset–I Get It: Effects of Co-workers' Stress Cues on Help-seekers' Social Diction and Empathy in TelecommutingInternational Journal of Human-Computer Studies10.1016/j.ijhcs.2024.103218(103218)Online publication date: Jan-2024
    • (2024)Heart Rate-Based Emotion Recognition and Adaptive Emotion Regulation Support with Wrist-Worn Wearables: A Systematic Literature ReviewInformation Systems and Neuroscience10.1007/978-3-031-58396-4_31(355-366)Online publication date: 26-Jul-2024
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