Sensors and Sensibilities: Exploring Interactions for Habitat Comfort with An Environmental-Physiological Sensing Eyewear In the Wild

Buildings increasingly incorporate sensing and actuation techniques to automate the regulation of temperature, lighting, ventilation, and more. This trend seeks to minimize human intervention, justified by the promise of enhancing energy optimization. However, it has been widely acknowledged that loss of control over environmental conditions can lead to a diminished perception of comfort and compromised long-term user awareness and satisfaction. How can we envision building systems that can interact with building inhabitants and engage them at the “right” time and place? In this work, we address this challenge through three key contributions: 1) AirSpecs, a novel smart glasses-based system that enables holistic sensing of Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) and physiological data, 2) an objective method for assessing environmental awareness using a peripheral LED light and a proposed comfort awareness process, and 3) design implications for addressing the fluidity of comfort. Over five days, 30 participants across three continents used the AirSpecs device and its accompanying mobile application. Through a mixed-methods analysis of user interactions, post-experience surveys, interviews, and co-design sessions, we present findings and design scenarios that demonstrate the potential of our contributions to enhance occupant engagement and comfort in smart buildings in the future. • Novel eyewear and apps enable access-anywhere interaction and personal attachment. • Comfort awareness transits between subliminal, preconscious, and conscious states. • Focus, ambient aid, and reflection modes can be designed for three awareness states. • Users prefer to interact with a semi-automated building system.