The Problem:
"Average annual productivity losses per worker due to chronic backache were $1,230 for male workers, measured in 1996 dollars, and $773 per female worker. These figures translated into aggregate annual productivity losses from chronic backache of approximately $28 billion in the United States." - NCBI, J.A. Rizzo et. al.
Course:
Data Visualization, 3rd Semester Professor: Zach Pino
My Role:
This was an Individual project but involved lot of in class discussion to evolve the project to the end outcome.
To find data that is present in the context of the problem I did contextual research, fly on the wall observation & interviews. There was subsequent strategy development and finally the end prototype with some testing and getting people reaction.
Skills:
D3 Data Visualization, Python coding, Raspberry pi based electronic prototyping
Breaking News.
Humans are turning into shrimps!
Noticing the problem
One of my roommate suffers from back pain due to extended times sitting on his chair while studying. He uses a posture correction belt from Despite the condition he told me he can't actively be conscious about his sitting posture while also focusing on work.
I decided to look further into this problem, and I started with observations of my peers and professors around the institute.
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I found 5 participants in the project with desk work and 2 professors to collaborate with me on the technical side.
Research
Fly on the wall observation (Cam on Tripod)
Interviewing People
A. Nikam
"I try to use the posture corrector to help with my posture after work, but it's not very comfortable to wear for the entire day."
S. Panda
"Sitting happens naturally, I don't usually think what kind of pose I am sitting when I am engaged in work or a discussion."
C. Silva
"I would like to be more aware of my posture, but I think someone will have to make me aware of it, like you are doing right now."
Research on Existing solutions
There are products that can help with your posture, now that you are more aware, would you use them?
Upright (Commitment issue):
"I have heard about it, but I don't know if I will buy it. Seems like a big commitment to fix it on my back every day with an expensive price."
A. Nikam
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Massage Devices (Last case scenario):
"I do have a body roller that I use when I get severe back ache, it comes in handy when the pain gets unbearable"
A. Nikam
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Back Braces (Negative Perception):
"I won't wear a back brace. I think that's for people severe back problems, I just get back ache sometimes."
S. Panda
"How might we create an effective stimulation for corrective action?"
Ideation: Rethinking the problem in terms of preventative healthcare
Visualization of your daily sitting posture
Visualization has been an effective tool for making invisible conditions visible and the smart watch apps are good examples of generating goal driven data visualization that help you make informed decisions especially for your health.
Finding Co-relations within Activities
When we are sitting on a chair, people are always engaged in some activities. If there could be more insights on which activity the person is spending more time hunched forward, then it will help in creating awareness next time the person does the same activity.
Personalized chair built according to the posture
Every person has their own sitting preferences, if the posture data can be collected to customize chairs based on sitting patterns it will lead to better designed chairs based on your physic and habits.
Thinking about 'data' that can be turned into usable information.
Context of use
Understand the datapoints correlated with use
I spent a semester worth of time to study people working on their projects around the institute. I wanted to know if there can be a better noninvasive way to collect data. After some ideation with my peers, I understood the datapoints is highly situated on the chair.
Humanizing the data
Time, date, activity, position
To keep all the data that would be useful to the person seeking insights on their posture it was important to identify the related data along with posture. Time of a particular posture along with date becomes the differentiator of the posture data itself while the activity can be collected through the calendar schedules.
So how do we make posture data?
Thinking posture curve as 3 points in the X,Y,Z axis
The back of the chair can be the 0 position and the senor distance from the back of chair to the head, torso and abdomen gives us 3 points away from the back of the chair which shows us the posture curve.
Initial sketch visualizations
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Implementation Strategy
Takeaways
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Why not think about data as a design tool? It makes sense to designers (discussed within peers) it just needs little bit of humanizing by the contextualizing its use and cause of generation with people.
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Personal insights which are educational can be a better way to create behavioral changes within people instead of persuasion.
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If I could do the project again, I would like to have critique session of the project to understand if I am missing out on something essential within the domain of preventative healthcare that didn't come up in the research.