Ambivalences in Digital Contraception: Designing for Mixed Feelings and Oscillating Relations
Zotero / D&S Group / Top-Level Items 2024-12-10
Item Type
Conference Paper
Author
Joo Young Park
Author
Nadia Campo Woytuk
Author
Deepika Yadav
Author
Xuni Huang
Author
Rebeca Blanco Cardozo
Author
Marianela Ciolfi Felice
Author
Airi Lampinen
Author
Madeline Balaam
URL
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3563657.3596062
Series
DIS '23
Place
New York, NY, USA
Publisher
Association for Computing Machinery
Pages
416–430
ISBN
978-1-4503-9893-0
Date
July 10, 2023
DOI
10.1145/3563657.3596062
Accessed
2024-12-09
Library Catalog
ACM Digital Library
Abstract
The ‘intimate horizons’ of algorithmic, self-tracking technologies have become increasingly important. These applications are no longer perceived as distant, instrumental entities, but offer a more affective and intimate experience. In this paper, we address the long-term experience of living with a digital contraception technology that utilizes self-tracking. We draw upon four design workshops with a total of 14 users of the app Natural Cycles to illustrate moments of ambivalent affects and oscillating relations. Based on our analysis, we concretize four dimensions of ambivalence in different scales and temporalities. We propose three strategies of designing with these unavoidable disruptions, conflicting feelings, and shifting relations to acknowledge users’ agentic engagements, nuanced dynamics of intimate self-tracking experiences, and users as embodied and affective beings. We contend that by attending to these existential ambivalences, digital contraceptive can become better configured to plural modes of life and long-term intimate relations that they engender.
Proceedings Title
Proceedings of the 2023 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference
Short Title
Ambivalences in Digital Contraception