Providing inclusive and empathetic technology for the marginalized in cities and workplaces

Does technology benefit all equally? Well, not really. Technology spreads unevenly; there are those who cannot easily approach technology for diverse reasons (e.g., construction/mining workers in harsh fields where technology cannot be readily deployed, seniors and other marginalized people with lack of digital competence) and from there, a new dimension of exclusion (technological exclusion) has been happening in our society.

Attentive Hub, a research group in civil engineering at the University of Alberta, ponders how technology can be more inclusive. Our focus is on our daily surroundings, such as workplaces, buildings, parks, roads, and sidewalks, where the colors of our lives are determined; we are deploying technologies that enables those daily surroundings to equitably attentive to all the diverse individuals’ needs and feelings so that the surroundings can be safe, healthy, comfortable, and truly inclusive. To achieve this goal, we attend to up-to-current trends in technologies, such as human sensing, AI, robots, extended reality, and digital twins, and integrate them with psychophysiological and socio-cognitive theories.