Author(s):

Christensen, Henrik, B.; Bardram, Jakob, E.

Title:

Supporting Human Activities - Exploring Activity-Centered Computing

Publication:

Ubicomp 2002: Ubiquitous Computing 4 th International Conference

Keywords:

attention; appeal; collaborative systems; conceptual models; distraction; interaction; interruption; interviews; participatory design; qualitative research methods; self-reporting

Paper Summary:

The paper presents an activity-centered perspective that supports the tasks and/or processes that a person has to carry out as part of a job. The paper recaps the activities and needs of healthcare workers as part of a process to design a ubicomp application that would allow clinicians to access computerized data from a variety of access points throughout a hospital. Some of the characteristics of the healthcare workers include:

1. Shared material. Clinicians share information / artifacts and need to access many different systems to obtain necessary information.
2. Organizing Work in Activities. Healthcare staffers work in an atmosphere where things are chaotic. They rush around, seldom sit down, interrupt each other frequently, are distracted by pages and cell phones, etc.
3. Mobility. Clinicians do not have a desk and do must of their work on the go.
4. Interruptions. Healthcare workers frequently interrupt each other to ask for opinions, advice, etc. This type of collaboration is frequently based on interruptions, not a linear process.
5. Ad-Hoc Collaboration. Clinicians frequently work with other healthcare workers in an ad-hoc fashion.

These observations about healthcare workers have been primarily derived from intensive activity-centered design workshops with clinicians.

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