Demo: A social wearable that affords vulnerability

Abstract

We present’True Colors’: a social wearable prototype designed to augment co-located social interaction of players in a LARP (live action role play). We designed it to enable the emergence of rich social dynamics between wearers and non-wearers. True Colors is Y-shaped, worn around the upper body, and has front and back interfaces to distinguish between actions taken by the wearer (front), and actions taken by others (back). To design True Colors, we followed a Research-through-Design approach, used experiential qualities and social affordances to guide our process, and co-designed with LARP designers. 13 True Colors wearables were deployed in a 3-day LARP event, attended by 109 people. From all the functionalities and interactivity the device afforded, players gravitated towards ones that emphasized the social value of experiencing vulnerability as a prompt to get together. This project was recently presented in CHI’19 [1] and may offer useful insights to others in the UbiComp/ISWC community who develop technology to support co-located social experience.