Novel Interactive Technologies and Design Tools for Mindful Eating

Guluzade, Lala and Sas, Corina (2026) Novel Interactive Technologies and Design Tools for Mindful Eating. PhD thesis, Lancaster University.

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Abstract

Mindfulness practices have been shown to have significant benefits for both physical health and mental wellbeing, as well as for eating behaviours. A growing body of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research has explored designing interactive technologies to facilitate and overcome the challenges of mindfulness as well as supporting healthy eating, particularly in the Human-Food Interaction (HFI) area. Despite such exploration in both the HCI and HFI, however, less work has integrated these two relatively independent research areas to design for mindful eating. This thesis addresses this shortcoming, drawing on the exploration of mindful eating practitioners’ expertise, functionality, and user reviews of commercial apps, as well as novel design methods and mindful eating technology. The thesis presents four studies as well as the design of a new method and a novel mindful eating prototype. The first study explores the functionalities of 23 toprated commercial apps for mindful eating. The second study investigates mindful eating practices and their challenge through interviews with 21 mindful eating expert professionals to explore their main clients, tools, interventions, and challenges, as well as their approaches for addressing such challenges. The third study presents the design of Mindful Eating Design Critique (MEDEC) cards, grounded in a scoping review on mindful eating, along with an analysis of health research on mindful eating principles, measurement scales, and therapeutic interventions such as the Mindfulness Based Eating Awareness Training (MB-EAT) program. The following chapter presents the evaluation of the MEDEC cards with 36 expert practitioners who used them to critique design exemplars of technologies from HCI and HFI, targeting aspects of mindful eating. The fourth study describes the design of dLITE, a novel prototype comprising smart tableware and its counterpart app interface, intended to provide subtle guidance for mindful eating. The following chapter describes the evaluation of dLITE prototypes with 20 participants, including both experienced and novice mindfulness practitioners. The thesis’s main contributions are the following: C1 An analysis was conducted to examine the extent to which current top-rated commercial applications align with, or diverge from, the core principles and theoretical foundations of mindful eating. The findings reveal that such apps lack a strong foundation in the theoretical underpinnings of mindful eating, particularly MB-EAT and its aspects, which require sensitive interface design to support bodily awareness and provide psychoeducation informed by compassion therapy. C2 A rich insight of expert practitioners, uncovered the main challenges related to mindful eating practice, used interventions for different client groups, and tools encouraged how these insights could inform the design of mindful eating technologies. The findings of the Chapter 6 revealed challenges related to bodily awareness, user attitudes, and the eating environment. These discussions raise new questions for the HCI community, such as what design principles can be applied to develop interactive technologies that effectively support mindful eating? how can technology mitigate the challenges identified by mindful eating expert practitioners? C3 Clarity of the concept, theory, and practice of mindful eating was achieved through its redefinition and reconceptualisation. Defining mindful eating aspects from health research, including its principles, scales, and most widely used and validated interventions, led to a working definition of mindful eating that allows HCI scholars and designers to consider such aspects when designing mindful eating technologies. Mindful eating aspects represent bridging concepts by grounding in health research on mindful eating definitions, principles, measurement scales, and most effective interventions; a form of design knowledge that connects theory and practice to inform novel designs and theory development. Communication of these aspects led to the design of the MEDEC design tool, which allows HCI scholars and designers to consider technologies and how their functionalities support or hinder aspects of mindful eating. C4 A scoping literature review was conducted on technologies targeting the primary aspects of mindful eating. The review outcome enabled the identification of current technologies, the creation of a corpus of design exemplars, and the definition of key features of a range of technologies that support or hinder mindful eating, providing resources for future researchers and designers interested in designing mindful eating technologies. C5 A set of design considerations and associated mindful eating critique cards was developed to support the design of mindful eating technologies. Mindful eating aspects represent bridging concepts by grounding in health research on mindful eating definitions, principles, measurement scales, and most effective interventions; a form of design knowledge that connects theory and practice to inform novel designs and theory development. Communication of these aspects led to the design of the MEDEC design tool, which allows HCI scholars and designers to consider technologies and how their functionalities support or hinder aspects of mindful eating. C6 An analysis was conducted by experts to examine how novel technologies can support mindful eating. Expert feedback led to the identification of technology functionalities and how these functionalities create tensions between mindful eating aspects; thus, design articulations were arranged in a grid by mapping the main mindful eating aspects to the functionalities of three groups of technologies that reflect the main areas of interest within the current state of the art, thus encouraging HCI scholars and designers to address less explored mindful eating aspects. C7 Mindful eating prototypes were designed and evaluated in an in-lab study to demonstrate how the findings from this research can inform the successful creation of mindful eating prototypes. This encourages HCI scholars and designers to focus on subtle guidance that promotes reflection on eating behavior through internal cues, rather than external feedback, by designing an eating pattern and its duration that unfolds over time.