Pressages: Augmenting Phone Calls With Non-Verbal Messages

This week, we had a lecture from Eve Hoggan, co-author of "Pressages: Augmenting Phone Calls With Non-Verbal Messages" [1]. She discussed her research on ForcePhone which allows the sending of non-verbal messages by squeezing their phone. Vibration technology is mostly used purely for feedback. However, Eve and her team propose using vibrations to become part of the conversation itself.

A user study was conducted that showed how couples in long distance relationships could use Pressages to augment their communication. The conclusion was that augmenting communication in this way has value in expressing greetings, presence and emotions.

References:

[1] "Eve Hoggan, Craig Stewart, Laura Haverinen, Giulio Jacucci and Vuokko Lantz",Pressages: Augmenting Phone Calls With Non-Verbal Messages,"UIST '12, October 7-10 2012", ACM 2012