FORUM INTERACTION AND ARCHITECTURE
relation is the situation of two people
walking toward each other in a
narrow corridor. At some point, they
must take action to avoid walking
into each other. Often, they both
move toward the same wall of the
corridor. Then, realizing that this
would again cause a collision, they
both move to the other side,
mirroring each other’s movements.
This dance continues until one of
them breaks the interactional
coupling. In this example, the
narrowness of the corridor shaped
the interaction between the two
people. Now imagine that the
environment actively participates in
such a coordination of its
inhabitants’ behaviors.
Figure 2. Inter-bodily resonance between inhabitant and adaptive architecture.
expression, and so forth. This
process can become autonomous and
continue without either agent
actively trying to influence it. Thus, a
continuous interaction cycle emerges
that Fuchs calls inter-bodily resonance
(Figure 2).
This mechanism of potentially
autonomous micro-adjustments
between interaction partners can be
transferred to and used for our
interactions with adaptive
architecture. Arguably, adaptive
architecture has both perceptive and
expressive abilities through its use of
sensors and actuators, which are
coordinated by software—in sum, a
sensorimotor system. The inhabitant
expresses a behavior, which the space
senses. The sensory data is then
processed and sent to actuators to
express environmental behavior,
which the inhabitant perceives. This
illustrates the biofeedback loop as
described by Schnädelbach.
However, what Fuchs describes
operates in both directions: Each
partner participates equally in the
interaction. So, what happens if the
environment not only reflects the
behavior of its inhabitant but also
becomes proactive?
ExoBuilding, which moves up and
down in response to a person’s
breathing, thereby establishing a
biofeedback loop. To reverse this
feedback loop, we took control away
from participants after some time
and without their knowing. We first
adaptively blended inhabitant
behavior and automated
environmental behavior, then
progressively faded out inhabitant
input until only automated
environmental behavior remained.
Following this transition of control,
the environment slowed down its
movement pattern. Most
participants followed this change and
adjusted their breathing (one group
knowingly, another unknowingly) to
the slowing movement of the
adaptive environment. In other
words, they synchronized their
behavior with the environment.
Architectural spaces that can
predictably lead inhabitants to
specific behaviors might, for
example, be used in therapy,
rehabilitation, or for relaxation
purposes.
There are numerous situations—
other than in narrow corridors—in
which we already coordinate our own
behavior with that of others. For
example, we engage in dancing,
playing sports, or making music. If
we perceive this coordination to be
successful, we might feel a stronger
sense of cohesion with our partner(s).
And interpersonal synchrony has
further benefits, which others have
extensively researched. Among them
are: the establishment of rapport,
positive effects on social perception,
improvement of memory, increased
self-awareness and other-awareness,
increased social-emotional
development, improved self-regulation in children, and
improvements in work performance
while reducing anxiety. Thus, if
adaptive environments facilitated
synchrony between inhabitants, we
might experience positive effects on
the life we spend inside adaptive
buildings.
Reciprocal control. In one of our
studies, we investigated the
reciprocity of interactions between
inhabitant and adaptive space by
trying to have the environment lead
inhabitants to different behaviors [7].
We used an adaptive structure called
Synchrony. We have seen how the
enactive approach applies to the
interaction between an adaptive
environment and one inhabitant.
Now let’s look at how an adaptive
space can affect the interaction
between two inhabitants. Indeed, the
enactive approach already provides
for such a scenario [4]: A general
example used to illustrate this
First indications are that such
coordination between people might
be possible to achieve with adaptive
architecture. For example, we
conducted a study with yoga
practitioners in an adaptive
architecture prototype [8]. The
breathing of two practitioners was
measured and their synchronicity
expressed through a projected
graphic. This graphic faded in and
out based on how synchronized the
two were: High synchrony meant a
sharp image; low synchrony meant a
blurry image. Seeing a visualization
64 INTERACTIONS NOVEMBER–DECEMBER2017