Tableware: Social Coordination Through Computationally Augmented Everyday Objects Using Auditory Feedback

This research develops a novel way of rethinking cultural and social behavior using computationally augmented artifacts. These ‘instruments’ provide various types of auditory feedback when manipulated by certain actions within social contexts, such as a bar or dining space. They foster affective social engagement through the habitual and explorative actions that they afford in everyday contexts, and their resulting auditory feedback. The goal is not only to observe how social interactions are affected by the manipulation of augmented artifacts, but also to observe how the sounds and manipulations affect psycho-sociological [1] changes towards more collaborative social relations during the processes of participatory sense-making [2]. In this paper, we present: a) a study of dynamic social interaction and how we instrumented tangible artifacts to reflect and induce engagement, b) a literature review that provides background for our design methodology, c) ‘vocal prototyping’–a responsive media technique for developing action-sonic mappings, d) our experimental prototype based on this design methodology.