Digital Women’s Health

Digital Women’s Health is a research group bringing positive change to the design and research of digital technologies for women’s bodily transitions.

The Digital Women’s Health research group has expertise in the research, design and evaluation of digital technologies for women’s health. Over the last ten years we have undertaken design explorations around key transitions of women’s health, such as reproductive and sexual health and maternal health. By designing with women and with care for the body, we aim to raise awareness for and destigmatize often ignored areas of women’s health. With our design research, we provide and sustain body knowledge and curiosity in women, and develop methods to design for sensitive and tabooed areas. We want our research to have societal and political impact, rethinking which role digital technologies may have in supporting women’s reproductive and sexual health and responding to global challenges in relation to women’s inequality.

Menarche, Menstrual Cycles and Menopause

In our team, we are currently working on projects related to bodily experiences of menarche, menstrual cycles and menopause, by designing and developing digital technologies that make space for bodily transitions and enable trust and curiosity towards the uncertainty of changing bodies.

People of Digital Women’s Health

The Digital Women’s Health research group is affiliated with KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and part of the Interaction Design research team.

People involved in the research group:

Allies & collaborators:

Biomenstrual is a collection of biomaterial experiments and rituals for imagining, designing, and practicing menstrual care beyond the human body. This project is a collaboration between KTH and Konstfack via the NAVET hub. More info on the project website biomenstrual.com

Through Menopause Partnerships (2019-) we design with experiences of menopause using a participatory approach and taking a feminist stance. Our aim to break the taboo and the stigma surrounding this transition in people’s lives involves not seeing menopause as a problem to solve. Instead, we are fascinated by how technology could engage with experiences of menopause by touching and transforming them, and by cultivating an appreciation for the ever-changing body as a site for interaction and for the construction of new self-knowledge.

The “Pelvic Chair” (2019 – ) is a soma design research project which explores how shape changing technologies can touch the pelvic floor to give awareness of pelvic floor muscles. At present it consists of a series of custom made latex shapes which inflate and deflate to both touch different parts of the pelvic floor, and also give particular sensations, for example of relaxation. Through using soma design we explore what it means to be touched by technology, and how it should / can feel.

“Menarche Bits” (2019-) is a design research project that explores how digital technologies can make space for young people’s bodily and social experiences of menstruation in sport contexts. It consists of a collection of shape-changing and heat technologies that facilitate on-body learning and exploration. The technologies aims to facilitate conversations about menstruation, and inspire bodily movements that allow young menstruators to take space and trust their menstruating bodies. More info here.

“Curious Cycles” (2019-) are a set of cultural probes; objects and interactions designed to gather experiences and insights from five people who menstruate, throughout the duration of a cycle. The objects are meant to provoke reflections on the ways we currently relate to our bodies and bodily fluids and speculate on how we might relate to them in the future. More info here.

“Labella” (2015) is an augmented system designed to support pelvic fitness in women. It combines a pair of underwear for embodied intimate interaction and a mobile phone as a tool for embodied discovery. More info here.

“PeriodShare” (2015) is an internet-connected menstrual cup that tracks and shares menstrual data on social networks to challenge the menstruation taboo and the role of intimate data. More info here.

“FeedFinder” (2015-) is a free mobile application developed with breastfeeding mothers to provide them with an easy way to find and share suitable places to breastfeed when out in public. More info here.

Email:

balaam at kth dot se

Address:
KTH Royal Institute of Technology
School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Department of Media Technology and Interaction Design
Lindstedtsvägen 5, 6th floor
114 28 Stockholm
Sweden