Speaker
Description
Self-tracking tools have become so commonplace in our daily lives that interaction with them has become almost invisible. Therefore, documenting the appropriation of these tools in daily routines is complex. In order to study the subconscious affective and sensory experiences of interactions between humans and their self-tracking tools we asked long-time self-tracking runners to perform a run with their usual connected watch and a run without it. During these sessions, the athletes had to describe in real time their emotions, sensations, concerns and thoughts. We then conducted a semi-structured post-race interview to review the experiential "disruptions" that may have been caused by defamiliarization. This "withdrawal" approach aims to "experimentally" destabilize the lived experience in order to analyze affective and sensory experiences that have become routine or even incorporated behaviour. Results show that 1) the connected watch catalyzes a performative relationship with the body by constituting an injunction to surpass oneself, which can be experienced positively or negatively; 2) that its withdrawal induces some type of lack (of reference points for gait and motivational levers in particular) that the subjects seek to fill by various means; 3) that its absence is likely to destabilize certain subjects on the affective and perceptual levels. Results are discussed with regard to a) the agentive power of tools on people; b) the embodied and lasting effects of repeated interactions with the connected watch.
