Embodied notifications: implicit notifications through electrical muscle stimulation

Abstract

Notifications are an important function of mobile devices. They inform users about important events such as incoming messages or upcoming events. Prior work, however, showed that notifications can be disruptive which will become worse with the increasing number of notifications. Since notifications are currently not prioritized, disruption may lead to disregard of many important notifications. We propose embodied notification, a novel way of gaining the attention of the user. In contrast to regular ways of notifying the user such as presenting visual, auditory, or vibro-tactile cues, embodied notification use the body of the user as feedback channel. Thus, embodied notifications provide benefit to the user due to their embodiment and implicit nature. This novel type of notification can help gaining the attention of the user.