knowledge! In fact, anyone external
to the study may switch equipment
off, move it around, or tamper with it.
Visually intriguing equipment, such
as flashing LEDs, can pose a choking
hazard for pets and children [ 3] and
entice curious little hands (and paws!).
Mishaps like this are bound to happen
with research in the wild and there
is little you can do to prevent them.
However, it may be worth asking
participants at the start of the study to
note any times and dates that devices
were interfered with. You should also
label your sensors with the names of
the devices they are monitoring to help
return them to their desired place if
things get swapped, particularly if your
study is looking at specific devices.
Finally, it can also help to do a bit of
data analysis prior to the last visit with
a home, so that participants can help
resolve any mysteries arising from
unplanned sensor reconfiguration.
PARTICIPANT INTERACTION
Researcher roles. Similar to when
a plumber, electrician, or other
tradesperson visits your home, you
the researcher are the visitor that
disrupts the day-to-day routine of the
participants. This attracts attention and
queries from participants and requires
you to have different roles throughout
the deployment, two of which recurred
often for us: the technical expert and the
entertainer. For the former, participants
often watch what you are doing and ask
questions along the way. While they
observe your subset of technological
skills, they sometimes begin to see you
as the new IT guru: “Please can you
help me remove a notification on my
iPhone?” “Please can you fix my CD
player?” As the participant is already
helping you out by participating in
your research, you may feel obligated
to help them. For the role of the
entertainer, friendly (yet distracting)
encounters and conversations may
develop with participants while you are
trying to concentrate on deploying the
equipment. Such meetings can involve
young children within the household
giving you one of their toys to exclaim
at every 30 seconds—ignoring them
would just seem cruel. Cats, dogs, and
other pets may also be interested in
your presence in the home, leading
them to jump at you or stand on your
equipment for attention; this is a
particular difficulty for researchers
R
with allergies. Like Goulden et al.’s
recommendation for ensuring that both
technical and social researchers attend
in-the-wild studies for interdisciplinary
work [ 6], we suggest that two or more
team members are present when
possible at household studies so that
one researcher can focus on deploying
the equipment while another can pay
attention to the householders.
Power relationships. When
deploying equipment in family
homes, the presence of child-parent
relationships and the power conflicts
embedded within them become
apparent. Parents like to know what
their children are doing and ask
for reassurance through the data
collected within deployments. One
mother asked us about her daughter’s
extensive device and Internet use; this
created a moral dilemma. While you
are obligated to protect the privacy
of all your participants (including
children), guardians have a duty of
care and therefore their concern
is understandable. It is difficult to
prepare for such inquisitiveness,
particularly if guardians are
persistent. However, fully informing
the participants at the beginning of
a study that no data will be shared
or discussed with other inhabitants
could help manage participant
expectations. This would potentially
head off confrontation if one particular
participant does not want to share their
data with other household members.
Researcher deploying an energy-monitoring sensor behind a television in a home.
Researcher deploying an energy-monitoring sensor behind an office desk in a home.