Expanding Personal Informatics: Menstruation and Pregnancy Healthcare Journey for Practising Muslim Women

Abstract

While HCI research in women's health continues to increase, HCI researchers have yet to conduct work at the intersection of women's health and religious practices. This oversight is particularly troubling given how religious and faith practices influence health and impact individuals' behaviors, including interaction with technology in their everyday lives. In my research, I aim to design women's health technologies that simultaneously support the reproductive and pregnancy journey while considering, being inclusive of, and responsive to their religious goals and values. My dissertation is centered on the female Muslim population in the US. My completed studies focused on understanding how this population tracks its menstrual cycle (the starting phase for the reproductive and pregnancy healthcare journey), engaging with technology for tracking health and religious goals, and how they balance tracking within religious contexts such as Ramadan. These studies unveiled an intricate connection between tracking for health purposes and religiousrelated reasons, paving the way for my ongoing and future work, which I will discuss in the subsequent sections.