Supporting restoration in the home-work setting

Abstract

The amount of people working from home has
been increasing. However, working from home has its issues and consequences.
The degree to which one experiences recovery from stress and fatigue is limited
when working from home, which has consequences on motivation, performance,
health, and well-being. The aim of this project was therefore to develop a
product that supports restoration during working from home. One way to achieve
restoration is described by the Attention Restoration Theory, which poses that
interaction with an environment can restore mental fatigue if it meets four
properties: 1) a sense of being away, 2) fascination, or effort less attention,
3) extent, or a feeling of immersion, and 4) compatibility and congruence
between the person and the environment. If an experience meets these properties,
it can have similar restorative powers.  User
research with homeworkers following the context mapping method revealed where
the opportunities for an intervention lie. This user research showed that the
four properties of attention restoration were not all met in the current
home-work-environment, thereby limiting the possibility for the
home-work-environment to be restorative. Especially the sense of being away is
limited, due to inability to distance oneself physically as well as
psychologically from the workplace. A design direction was defined:
re-establishing the borders between work and non-work, and making the switching
moments more conscious.   Nature is particularly good in meeting the four
properties of attention restoration. Besides, nature can reduce stress, and
improve mood and wellbeing. Biophilic design takes into account these
advantages of nature and translates them into guidelines for design. A red
thread throughout the concepting phase of this project is therefore biophilic
design. The resulting design of this project is Ecflo, an inflatable lamp that
functions as a break-reminder through dynamic light textures. Ecflo creates a
liminal moment at the switching moments between work and non-work. Upon the
start of a home-work-day the user inflates Ecflo, an interaction functioning as
energizer. When it is time for a break, Ecflo moves and creates light effects,
drawing the user’s attention away from the screen, towards a moment of
fascination. Ecflo creates a conscious decision at this switching moment:
continue work, or take a break. This way, it helps in structuring the
home-work-day and helps separate work and non-work. Ecflo is restorative in the
sense that it creates fascination through random and ephemeral patterns and
movements. The design sustains interest, and thereby creates extent. The design
is compatible in the sense that it is suitable for working from home and the
home environment. However, evaluation study showed that the feeling of being
away is limited, as Ecflo does not fully create an escape experience. Evaluation
of the concept was done using the Perceived Restorativeness for Activities Scale.
However, this scale is not fully suitable for product evaluation. Development of
a research method suitable for evaluation of a product’s restorative potential
is thus needed to evaluate Ecflo’s restorative potential. For further development
of the concept, a functioning model should be made and tested with homeworkers.