Towards the crafting of personal health technologies

We introduce a novel approach that merges craft and health technologies to empower people to design and build their own personal health visualizations. In this mutually beneficial union, health technologies can be more meaningful to an individual and encourage higher appropriation, while craft technologies can explore interesting problems in a challenging domain. In this paper, we offer a framework for designing health-craft systems and showcase a system that provides users with the ability to craft their own personalized wearable device. The device tracks their outdoor exposure and visualizes their weekly progress on an ambient tree painting. Finally, we report on a pilot study using this personalized feedback system. Our main contribution is the new lens through which designers can approach health and craft technologies that enhances health management with personal expressiveness and customization.

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