ACI2016: Third International Conference on Animal-Computer Interaction

16th-17th November 2016, Milton Keynes, UK
#aci2016conf
 
In co-operation with ACM and SIGCHI
 
In recent years an increasing body of work from within the interaction design community has been shaping the emerging field of Animal-Computer Interaction (ACI), with a focus on: 1) studying the interaction between animals and technology in naturalistic settings, around specific animal activities or interspecies relations; 2) developing user-centered technology that can improve animals’ welfare and support animals in their activities; 3) informing user-centered approaches to the design of technology intended for animals, derived from both interaction design and animal science.
 
The ACI2016 conference builds on a series of ACI events (SIG meeting at CHI2012, workshops at NordiCHI2014 and BHCI2015, symposia at AISB2014 and MB2016, 1st and 2nd congress at ACE2014 and ACE2015) to advance this area of research and practice, and to support the emergence of ACI as an academic discipline.
 
The conference is in co-operation with the ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) and SIGCHI (ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Human Interaction). Conference proceedings are published by ACM and will appear in the ACM Digital Library.
 
We welcome contributions originating from any discipline related to ACI, and describing work within diverse contexts. We specifically invite the submission of:
 
long and short papers (submission deadline 23rd June 2016)
workshop proposals (submission deadline 10th July 2016)
doctoral consortium abstracts (submission deadline 18th September 2016)
video posters and demos (submission deadline 18th September 2016)
 
Contributions are encouraged in relation to any of the following topics:
 
Design – interaction modalities that may need to be developed in order to make technology accessible to other animals; novel designs for users with different sensorial apparatuses, cognitive capabilities, and ergonomic characteristics; multisensory interfaces and alternative interactional paradigms appropriate for ACI; design solutions developed within ACI applications that could inform design within HCI.
 
Methodology – methodological frameworks enabling animals to actively participate in the design process as legitimate stakeholders, contributors and users; HCI methodologies that can be called upon when designing with animals or investigating how technology affects them and their interactions with humans; methodologies that can be adapted from HCI or derived from other disciplines; more-than-human approaches developed within ACI that could contribute to HCI practices.
 
Theory – main challenges that ACI researchers may encounter in conceptualizing the interaction between humans, animals and technology; ways of interpreting the outcomes
of applied studies, concrete designs and research practices to articulate such interactions; existing theoretical frameworks from HCI, animal science, or other disciplines, that ACI theories can draw from or contribute to.
 
Ethics – legitimate technological applications for ACI; implications of ACI’s animal-centered perspective for conducting research that involves animal participants; ethical frameworks that may or may not be suitable to support the development of ACI; relation between ethics and methodology in ACI; potential influence of ACI ethics on ethical aspects of HCI research.
 
Applications – ACI applications that can improve animal welfare or human-animal practices in a range of contexts; animal technologies that do or do not constitute good examples of or models for ACI.