Designing Interaction Around Smart and Autonomous Systems

Advancements in computational power and more complex machine learning algorithms, along with a doubling in the size of the digital universe are leading to an increasingly autonomous world. Although this presents opportunities to help us make better decisions, work and live more efficiently, it is unclear as yet how we can design human interaction around complex ML and AI algortihms that are often impenetrable not only for end users, but also for the designers of interactive products in order to achieve a truly smart and autonomous reality.
This project aims to advance our understanding of human interaction with more complex and smart autonomous systems by using an app that automates the process of separating notifications into different categories, choosing to display only certain notifications depending on the type of activity the user is currently in, eg. work notifications during office hours and leisure notifications at night. The research will follow established methods involving in the wild studies where the user installs the app on their phone and sets up the notification configuration - their app usage will then be monitored to explore the level of interaction and trust or reliance that different users have and how this may change over time.