Miles apart but close at heart?

1.1 Research goals and contributions

The objective of this paper is to offer a more proficient theoretical basis on how relatedness technologies need to be designed to make users accept and want to use a product. It provides comprehensive insides about noteworthy aspects from the perspective of different target groups.

A large number of psychological theories and research deals with relatedness, its facets, triggers and consequences. However, this knowledge is rarely transferred to the context of technologies and used during their development. Thus, this paper reveals and links underlying thoughts, needs and views that should be considered in the creation of such products as well as design implications that call for further systematic investigation.

In the following, first, theoretical approaches and previous findings related to relatedness as well as the acceptance of technologies are presented. Based on this, initial assumptions about relevant user experience (UX) factors for the acceptance of such technologies are proposed that serve as a starting point for the subsequent empirical investigation. Second, an explorative qualitative research study conducted with four different focus groups is described, which highlights different types of relevant UX factors as well as more general insights for design and evaluation. Last, findings from the focus groups are classified and linked with previous literature. Resulting limitations and further research directions are discussed.

2.1 Relatedness

A variety of psychological theories on the basis of motivation and behavior include relatedness or belongingness as a central factor that influences people and is essential for well-being. Based on multiple psychological theories this need can be described as “the feeling of having regular intimate contact with people who care about you rather than feeling lonely and uncared for” [21, p. 339]. For example, Maslow [22] saw the fulfilment of relatedness needs as crucial for flourishing motivation. Ryan and Deci [9, 23] also emphasized the importance of relatedness in their Self Determination Theory (SDT), in which they proposed three initial psychological needs, including the factor relatedness next to autonomy and competence. Depending on the type of relationship, relatedness can come in different forms and needs as well as expectations to be met in order to feel loved or connected (e.g., [24]) and relationships can be characterized according to various aspects [25–27]. Moreover, the performed behaviors to feel close to each other can differ in their universality and occurrence in daily routines [28–31]. Due to these significant differences between types of relationships and how they are practiced, we suggest that it is crucial to take the individual fit of a technology to the respective relationship into account as a relevant UX factor when designing relatedness technologies. However, one behavior that can be seen at the very core of all relationships and is crucial for their development is self-disclosure – the revealing and sharing of intimate information. Therefore, we also suggest confidentiality as an important factor to be considered when designing such technologies. Furthermore, the need for belonging is to be distinguished from mere social interactions someone could also experience with strangers, as it is associated with the belief that the counterpart cares about and likes one in the same way – so that the feelings one has are reciprocal [8]. Hence, we also suggest considering the consequences of violated reciprocity as a relevant acceptance factor.

2.2 Conceptualizations of technology acceptance and user experience

So far, no universally valid definition of technology acceptance can be found in the literature. While in some cases acceptance is described as the actual use of a technology [32], it is otherwise defined as the intention to use it [33]. Regarding the usage of certain technologies in private environments the definition of the intention to use has been found to be more suitable [34]. Thus, we define acceptance as the intention to use a technology.

Many well-known models that deal with the acceptance of technologies such as, for example, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) by Davis [32] focus on utilitarian aspects of the technologies. However, technologies also have other purposes that are not solely utilitarian – like creating the feeling of relatedness. These aspects are considered hedonic qualities and refer to non-goal-oriented qualities that are not necessarily directly associated with the fulfillment of a task but still pose important determinants of accepting a technology [35]. Hassenzahl et al. [36, 37] developed a two-component model for the evaluation and usage behavior of a product in order to gain more insight into user experience. In this model, hedonic usefulness and pragmatic usefulness are separated as two different qualities and thus non-task-related needs are also considered as relevant factors for the acceptance of technologies. In further theoretical approaches concerning the perception of innovative technologies, different hedonic factors have been picked up by researchers and were integrated into their proposed models. Contexts were e.g., Nintendo Wii [38] or virtual reality (VR) games [39–41]. One factor that emerged specifically in the context of technologies used for communication or the exchange of information like messengers, video chat systems or social networks, was the trustworthiness of the technology and that one can feel safe while using it [42, 43]. As this is especially relevant for all relatedness technologies, we also propose trustworthiness as a UX factor.

Concerning the development of relatedness technologies, Hassenzahl et al. [4] provided initial psychological assumptions that should be taken into account. This includes privacy and controllability issues when a technology requires self-disclosure as well as reciprocity regarding the use of the technology in order to generate more satisfaction among the users. The feeling of intimacy has furthermore been investigated by Janssen et al. [44] by applying principles from affective computing on connectedness devices. Therefore, they also highlight the importance of self-disclosure and the accompanying privacy issues in order to feel intimacy as well as the contrary effects when the behavior is not reciprocal or automated. Other factors that emerged during the process of designing and testing such technologies were again privacy along with user control or autonomy [45, 1] and an easy and seamless integration of the system [46–49]. These findings further support the importance of the factors confidentiality, reciprocity, and trustworthiness as proposed above. The technologies considered here ranged from always-on videos at home [46] communication systems (e.g., text messaging, video conference systems; [49]) or awareness technologies [47, 48]. For privacy-relevant technologies, Distler et al. [50] also point out that context-related factors should be examined as well as users’ needs such as autonomy and control, that can provide additional insights on the intention to use a technology [50, 51]. Therefore, we additionally propose to consider the context and location of use as an important UX factor in the design of relatedness technologies. Furthermore, automaticity of communication, such as automatic communicated emotions and responds, leads to a decrease of felt intimacy [44] which is why, lastly, we also propose conveying intentionality to be important during the design process. Nevertheless, when it comes to technologies that fulfil needs such as relatedness, there is a lack of a more thorough insight on factors that play a role in their acceptance [52].

2.3 Initial list of UX factors for relatedness technologies

All in all, based on the related work on relatedness and previous UX concepts, the following initial higher-level factors and corresponding working definitions are proposed that provide the basis for the subsequent focus group interviews. As all these factors play a significant role in either the context of relatedness itself or corresponding technologies, taking these into account when designing relatedness technologies could lead to a higher acceptance of such.

1. Confidentiality

   Control over who knows what and when about someone, and the level of detail.

2. Context of use

   (Social) context and location where the technology is intended to be used and implemented.

3. Reciprocity

   Extent to generate the feeling of rejection due to a usage imbalance among the users.

4. Individual fit

   Extent to which the technology aligns with the needs of the users’ relationship and allows for adopting its use and functionalities as one’s own (e.g., regarding interpretation of functions).

5. Trustworthiness

   Extent of sense of security and well-being, or absence of shame, when using the technology.

6. Intentionality (vs. automatism)

   Active, conscious usage and response behavior of the technology (as opposed to automatically generated responses from it).

3.1 Participants

Participants were recruited through different systems and newsletters and did not know each other to ensure an open atmosphere during discussion. The prerequisite for participation was to be over 18 years of age and to be assignable to one of the listed categories. An overview is given below (Table 1).

3.2 Procedure

The study was approved by the ethics committee of the university and participation was compensated with 15 EUR lasting between 60 and 75 min each. Participants were told that the subject of interest was their opinion on interactive technologies. The procedure was the same in both cases, the onsite focus groups and the ones conducted via Zoom. The focus groups were conducted by two moderators who followed a semi-structured guideline and were opened with a general welcome and insight into the process, followed by different stimuli and points of discussion.

1. Relatedness reports. Participants were asked to briefly describe how they create feelings of relatedness in their respective groups when they are actually together.

2. Brainstorming UX factors for acceptance. Participants were shown three different product ideas. Each of them was supposed to depict a different kind of relatedness-generating strategy derived from the review by Hassenzahl et al. [4] and covered the most common strategies used in relatedness technologies. These were: awareness (sharing information about current activities), expressivity (expressing a thought or emotion), and joint action (doing something together). At first, it was only indicated what the product does (e.g., “Imagine a technology that allows you to know what one of your friends is currently doing or where they are, and vice versa.”) without explicitly explaining and showing a specific product. The guiding questions of the discussion were the following: “What needs to be considered in the design of such a product for you to want to use it? What requirements would have to be met? What would tend to discourage and prevent you from using the product?”

3. Discussing existing product ideas. When no further input was generated by the participants or they struggled with imagining the described product, the concrete product ideas for the respective category were presented. Regarding awareness, the exemplary products were a video projection of the other person’s home for when they are at home and a light that varies in brightness depending on how far they are away from it. The video projection product was replaced by a radio that allows listening to colleagues while working in the colleagues group. The example product for expressivity was a wristband that lights up whenever a person triggers it and a stuffed animal that becomes warm when touched. The stuffed animal was replaced by a cube in the colleagues group. Regarding joint action, the exemplary product was VR goggles where one can see a representation of the other person or even physically feel each other through specific textiles and meet in the same location.

4. Acceptance factors. Participants were presented with the pre-identified UX factors from the literature review as listed in Section 2.3 one by one with their working definitions. Participants discussed the personal relevance of these factors and compared them with the previously mentioned aspects.

3.3 Data analysis

The focus group interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim. The interviews were originally conducted in German language. Transcripts were translated into English without paraphrasing. For the analysis, a narrative inquiry approach [53, 54] was followed, whereby in a first step individual relevant statements of the respective participants were marked. In a second step, these statements were summarized on superordinate levels within the group. The clustered findings from each focus group were then compared with each other and aggregated to semantic uniform aspects that best possibly describe and contain all the facets mentioned on group and individual level. The proposed factors from the literature review thereby also served as loose guidelines. The additionally identified factors were compared to the ones initially proposed and adapted, added or removed accordingly.

4.1 Motivators

4.2 Hygiene factors

4.3 Meta topics

4.3.2 Decreasing excitement

Another aspect that was mentioned in all groups is the fear that over time the excitement for use might diminish, such as with a toy: “I could imagine that after three days I would be bored and stop using it.” (P8) Especially over a longer period of time they were concerned that one might not get excited about using it anymore or even forget about using it: “[…] but I don’t know if that’s long term or if you use that for a week and then you’re like okay cool.” (P13) The comparison to a tamagotchi (i.e., a small handheld device displaying an electronic virtual pet that needs to be cared for) was drawn during two different focus groups. They stated that this could be prevented by changes in the functions or the achievement of different levels. Participants also indicated the need for an additional incentive to keep the technology exciting e.g., by adding humoristic features. An overview over all UX factors is given in Figure 1.

Figure 1:

Overview of UX factors for relatedness technologies.

4.4 Group preferences

According to the statements of the participants, the following preferences for the three technology categories can be drawn. The first product category awareness was liked most by the family and colleagues groups. The relationship group stated that they usually already know about what their significant others are doing. Also, when both are at home at the same time, chances are high that they might already be on the phone with each other. The friend group mostly stated that they were not really interested in that kind of information.

The second product category expressivity was liked most by the friends and relationship groups. However, concerns were raised in the friends group about how to handle it with more than one friend and that it might be difficult to coordinate more people. Hence, they might only use it within the context of close friends. In the family group, sending the sole message “I’m thinking of you” felt strange to them if they would not have the opportunity to give any further explanations or information. This was similar for the colleagues group with even more concerns because it might be seen as harassment.

The third product joint action was especially liked by all groups except the relationship group. Regarding this product, the relationship group stated they cannot imagine it to feel as real as it needs to in order for them to create feelings of relatedness. Contrary, the other groups, but especially the colleagues group, thought it was a good way of bringing across feelings of relatedness. Table 2 provides an overview of these group preferences.

5.1 An advanced checklist of UX factors of relatedness technologies

The revealed UX factors of relatedness technologies show parallels to existing concepts in UX research and relatedness research in psychology. Regarding the motivators, the factor individual fit, i.e., the fit between the technologies’ functions and the particular relationship, resonates with relatedness theories and maintenance strategies highlighting the differences in relationships and how these come along with different needs to be met [29–31]. Another UX factor that was not explicitly mentioned in UX literature before is realness i.e., a representation as accurate as possible of the desired stimulus, creating an experience as close to reality as possible. As also known from other HCI practices that can support a feeling of relatedness (e.g., sharing selfies), the perceived authenticity of the other one’s digital representation fosters positive experience [56]. Further, there is immediacy i.e., transporting the impulse easily and in real-time. The immediacy aspect shows parallels to the idea of simultaneity being important for technologies creating intimacy or evoking the feeling of joint action [4]. Lastly, intentionality i.e., knowing that triggering the action was intentional, which was already proposed by Janssen et al. [44]. Moreover, the motivators are interrelated to some degree and can also overlap or reinforce each other depending on the technology. For example, individual fit could create more realness and immediacy is partly reflected in a temporal component of realness.

Among the identified hygiene factors, confidentiality – i.e., being in control of the disclosure of one’s own information as well as the obtainment from others’, is also present in psychological relatedness theories which emphasize the importance of disclosing information (e.g., [8]). Also, context of use i.e., the preservation of intimacy and discreetness in different settings, corresponds to the preservation of privacy as a facet of relatedness [4, 44], as well as the need for autonomy and control [46–49]. While confidentiality refers to the interaction with the counterpart of the user, context of use comprises the environment, situation, and people around one while using the product. Finally, reciprocity i.e., the protection from feeling rejected or discomfort because of an unequal usage behavior, could be found to be relevant not only in real life [8, 9] but also when using technologies.

Moreover, two other factors of relevance for the experience of relatedness technologies (gathered under meta topics) could be identified: added value of use and decreasing excitement. Added value addresses the desire to have a clear idea of the technologies’ benefit (also beyond existing communication tools) to be seen as a desirable product. As also reflected in acceptance models for hedonic technologies [57, 58], the goal of experience-oriented products naturally differs from classical ideas of usefulness, and therefore requires an appropriate context-adequate definition. This may appear as a challenge when introducing relatedness technologies: one may even feel that it makes some of the magic of a relatedness experience to not define it in too many explicit words which will be discussed in more detail in the next Section 5.2. Finally, decreasing excitement addresses the potential risk of losing interest in using such technologies once one gets used to their functions. This aspect also resonates with factors proposed in technology acceptance models adapted for hedonic technologies such as enjoyment and playfulness, which tend to lose their attractiveness over time (e.g., [59–61]). This aspect was at first not included among the relevant UX factors as they were mostly mentioned in the context of technologies that solely serve hedonic purposes (like gaming).

Thus, in sum, the developed list of UX factors for relatedness technologies is also well-aligned with previous research on experience-oriented technologies. Note, however, that the present list of motivators and hygiene factors should not be seen as exclusive factors or as an exhaustive model. Instead, one may consider it as a checklist of considerable aspects for the design and evaluation of relatedness technologies, whereby the identified motivators represent possible starting points to design for relatedness and the hygiene factors represent possible obstacles for it. Naturally, the relevance of the factors from the proposed checklist also depends on the specific usage scenario and what kind of relatedness experience one wants to create. A key takeaway from the focus group interviews was that relatedness must not be understood as a design goal in a universal sense. Instead, it is a multifaceted construct that manifests itself differently (e.g., [25, 28]). Thus, before beginning to develop a concept, it is worthwhile to reflect on the envisioned scenario, target user group, and specific type of relatedness one aims to support. In conclusion, when designing for relatedness, one always needs to envision the specific type of experience to be created, and giving universal guidelines for design (e.g., more physical contact or giving more information is always “better”) would not do it justice.

5.2 Communicating “usefulness” of hedonic products

While previous research in HCI showed empirical support for the relevance of hedonic factors in technology acceptance (e.g., [60]), during the focus group interviews, it was noticeable that participants had a strong tendency towards discussing “pragmatic” aspects of the presented technologies. Although they did acknowledge the importance of feeling connected over distance and finding ways to do so, they easily fell into a pattern of searching for another use case or benefit regarding the product that goes beyond generating relatedness. Also, the products were often compared to texting or a phone call, wondering what their additional benefit would be. It seemed to be challenging to some extent to attribute the “benefit” of a product to aspects like having a positive or enriching experience. Despite this, participants also brought up the concern, that they might lose their excitement for the product over the course of time and thought about ideas combatting this. They argued to incorporate features that make the product more playful or entertaining and evolve over time. This indicates that they do see more than pragmatic value to it and actually desire an experience that goes beyond successfully carrying out a task, however, the focus of the discussion often shifted to the pragmatic benefits. A possible explanation for this could be the so-called “Hedonic Dilemma” [62], i.e., although people value the hedonic from an experiential perspective, they overemphasize the pragmatic in report and choice situations where they feel a need to justify, which is easier for pragmatic qualities. This may also apply to the participants in the interview situation, where they found it easier to justify a product with functional benefits (e.g., transfer even more information than with the smartphone) instead of focusing on how the product could provide them with experiences and emotions that enrich their lives.

5.3 Design implications

First and foremost, as outlined above, the revealed UX factors may serve as a checklist of possible factors to consider when conceptualizing technologies with relatedness as (one) design goal. In some cases, participants’ statements already provided initial ideas on the realization of those factors, which may serve as additional inspiration.

For example, among the motivators and the factor of individual fit, participants suggested opportunities for product customization in all kinds of ways – from different colors (which was also proposed by Dey & de Guzman [63]) to intensities, making it “fit” to the specific relationship in focus. While previous research (e.g., [4]) often highlights the benefits of ambiguous stimuli in the context of relatedness technologies (e.g., transferring light signals instead of verbal messages), participants in our focus groups partly disagreed on that. They were more concerned by the other person misinterpreting ambiguous stimuli in a negative way, e.g., as harassment, especially in the colleagues group. Further, regarding realness and immediacy, participants thought of ways that enable an adequate and real representation of the thought and feeling that one wants to transfer. Specifically in the context of products that enable joint action, like VR games, the execution should be as real as possible in terms of the avatars and surroundings. The user should be able to trigger the stimulus showing as little action as possible and also spending as little time as possible on triggering it in order to not let the moment pass by. Regarding intentionality, except for possibly automatic absence notes to prevent feelings of rejection, according to participants, automatic impulses should be avoided when designing for the feeling of relatedness.

Regarding the hygiene factors, confidentiality was proposed to be realized by being able to turn the technology off at all times or install settings that enable the user to adjust when or where the technology is turned on. The same adjustment should be configurable regarding the incoming information and stimuli. Further, the frequency of use could be restricted to a daily limit. Regarding context of use, and the option to use a technology in many different settings and not only at home, participants wished for portable products or technologies that can be integrated with existing technologies such as the smartphone. To ensure intimacy also in public contexts, sending and receiving stimuli should be able to happen discreetly and unobtrusively.

5.4 Limitations and future research directions

The present research provides an advanced basis for the research and development of relatedness technologies by combining relevant theoretical concepts from different strands of research and empirical insights from four focus groups. However, several limitations must be considered and can be taken up in future research.

First, the method of focus group interviews comes with specific restraints regarding reliability and generalizability of the results. Although focus groups present a good opportunity of gaining detailed and genuine insights into people’s views and experiences [64], at the same time, the results are subjective opinions and have to be interpreted as such. Moreover, the dynamics that arise during group interviews should not be disregarded. Participants’ answers may influence each other and draw the discussion more strongly into certain directions. We tried to counteract this by repeatedly encouraging the participants to widen their perspective and think of all the different aspects of their unique experiences. Furthermore, the setting of a group interview may not have been equally suitable for all group contexts. According to the impression of the moderators, the relationship group, for example, was more reserved when sharing their personal experiences than the other groups. Hence, we suggest examining topics that require a certain degree of privacy and openness from the participants by using interviews instead of focus groups to prevent feeling uncomfortable and enable more honest and open insights.

Second, as already discussed above, the list of revealed UX factors must be seen as an initial collection, but may be advanced by additional factors in the future. While we focused on the target groups and product scenarios that appeared to be the most relevant in the context of relatedness technologies, future studies could expand this to further domains. Also, based on the present insights, there are no clear and definite recommendations about which factors are the most important or which are more important compared to others. Therefore, next studies could examine the importance of different factors among different groups and relatedness experiences in more detail, whereby the here revealed group preferences regarding relatedness strategies provide a useful starting point.

Moreover, the present initial observations and presumptions about underlying factors for the acceptance of relatedness technologies should be further investigated in a systematic and hypothesis-driven manner. In this regard, it would also be necessary to develop more suitable measurement methods for the evaluation of relatedness technologies. As only few studies so far included an evaluation of their relatedness technology, no specific measurement methods exist yet. A first starting point for inspiration could be measurement scales developed for measuring social connectedness (see [65]), which could be adapted to the context of technology-mediated relatedness and suitable evaluation approaches for field studies (e.g., diary studies, experience sampling).