Human-Algorithm Relationships: Moving Beyond the Interaction as a Site of Empirical Research

TY - GEN

T1 - Human-Algorithm Relationships

T2 - 2024 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference, DIS 2024

AU - Garnham, Ignacio

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2024 Owner/Author.

PY - 2024/7

Y1 - 2024/7

N2 - As the algorithmic retrofitting of everyday interactions steadily advances, so does the need to understand how humans and algorithms influence each other over time. For this purpose, the interaction has become the primary site of empirical research. Yet, the relational, spatial and temporal boundaries that the interaction brings to bear are poorly defined, largely outdated and often restrictive. This results in novel findings aggregating to already worn-out narratives where the interaction is the only way algorithms participate and transform everyday life. In contrast, the concept of relationship, which entails relational, emotional, temporal, and spatial dynamics more attuned to how humans and algorithms increasingly influence each other, has received little attention. Borrowing Robert Hinde's framework of "patterned interactions=relationship,"this provocation challenges the limits of the interaction and argues that the relational boundaries of a relationship open up new opportunities for empirically researching how humans and algorithms influence each other over time.

AB - As the algorithmic retrofitting of everyday interactions steadily advances, so does the need to understand how humans and algorithms influence each other over time. For this purpose, the interaction has become the primary site of empirical research. Yet, the relational, spatial and temporal boundaries that the interaction brings to bear are poorly defined, largely outdated and often restrictive. This results in novel findings aggregating to already worn-out narratives where the interaction is the only way algorithms participate and transform everyday life. In contrast, the concept of relationship, which entails relational, emotional, temporal, and spatial dynamics more attuned to how humans and algorithms increasingly influence each other, has received little attention. Borrowing Robert Hinde's framework of "patterned interactions=relationship,"this provocation challenges the limits of the interaction and argues that the relational boundaries of a relationship open up new opportunities for empirically researching how humans and algorithms influence each other over time.

KW - Critical Algorithm Studies

KW - Ethnography of algorithms

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85198905539&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1145/3656156.3663715

DO - 10.1145/3656156.3663715

M3 - Article in proceedings

AN - SCOPUS:85198905539

SN - 979-8-4007-0583-0

SP - 74

EP - 78

BT - DIS 2024

PB - Association for Computing Machinery

Y2 - 1 July 2024 through 5 July 2024

ER -