bachelor thesis

Rethinking Our Bond with Devices

From endless notifications to attention-draining apps, modern devices often feel like adversaries rather than allies. Inspired by this disconnect, as my Bachelor Thesis I set out to explore how technology could integrate more harmoniously into our lives, respecting our focus and fostering well-being.  This exploration led to an interactive project designed to educate about and rethink our connection with technology. Through extensive research and intentional design, I’ve worked to spark dialogue and encourage us to reconsider what technology can and should be for us.

Role

whole project

Client

personal

Service

Ux, INTERACTION, Motion, 3d

Year

2023

Gallery

Research & Analysis

Mapping the Problems and Solutions

Using creative methods alongside surveys and extensive data analysis, I explored why modern technology often disrupts more than it supports. Smartphones, social media, and digital media were identified as key disruptors, pulling focus and undermining mental well-being. Meanwhile, less obtrusive yet essential technologies remain largely underappreciated. This research highlighted actionable areas for systemic change to create a more mindful and harmonious interaction with digital tools.

The Challange

Exhibition Concept

An Interactive Approach to Understanding

Through my research, I identified parameters shaping our daily interactions with technology—ones often overlooked but crucial to understanding how devices shape our lives. An interactive online exhibition became the ideal medium to reveal these issues, raise awareness, and showcase potential solutions in a format accessible to everyone.

The Challange

Exhibition 1

The first part of the exhibition focuses on the overwhelming impact of modern technology. It immerses visitors in a chaotic, overstimulating environment that mirrors the stress and urgency caused by today’s digital devices. Using intense visuals and hectic interactions, it highlights the negative paradigms and functions of technology, highlighting the urgency the need for change.

The Challange

For instance: This station visualizes the smartphone as a gravitational hub, concentrating everyday functions like navigation, messaging, and streaming, and illustrating how this dependency limits more fitting solutions.

By pairing short animations with clear text, the exhibition captures attention, evokes emotions, and explains the presented concepts.

By using disorienting and overstimulating digital content, the exhibition replicates the confusion and stress caused by constant tech interaction.

Early Spline Pototype

Try it out with W A S D & Mouse Click/Drag—no content yet, and shaders/resolution differ from the final version. Initially built with Spline for web accessibility, but it couldn’t handle the complexity and crashed.

Exhibition 2

The second part of the exhibition shifts from chaos to clarity, presenting a calm and focused vision for the future of technology. It showcases paradigms and approaches that reimagine how devices can seamlessly support our daily lives, fostering balance and well-being. This part answers the questions of the first exhibition and highlights how thoughtful design can integrate technology into our lives as subtle, empowering tools that enhance rather than disrupt.

The Challange

Environment

The environment unfolds with nature in focus, while technology remains in the background—supportive and serving, but never intrusive. It creates a calm atmosphere, conveying how technology should feel: unobtrusive and seamlessly integrated into our lives.

The exhibition features a clear guidance system, intuitively leading visitors—just as technology should—without confusion or distraction.

In contrast to the abstract animations of the first exhibition, this part presents concrete examples such as interfaces and objects, offering clear solutions and practical insights.

Seamless Integration

Concrete objects and systematic approaches are presented alongside ideas, illustrating Calm Technology in action. They explain both the advantages and drawbacks of technology, encouraging a more mindful perception of Calm Tech.

Conclusion

While working on the topic of how we can live in harmony with technology, I came to the following conclusions: it is a highly complex issue with various solutions and elements that cannot all be addressed here, but several key aspects stood out:

Expanding device design and infrastructure to focus on context-specific tools, rather than over-relying on smartphones, can reduce distractions and better align technology with human behavior.
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Technology should seamlessly adapt to users, offering relevant functions without interruptions. The responsibility for creating such devices lies with companies, not consumers, and achieving this requires societal pressure or proactive innovation.

The integration of calm technology into our environment, where it becomes nearly invisible, is essential for fostering a balanced and empowering relationship with the tools that shape our lives.

(Next Project)

WAGNER

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