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#LookWhatIDidNotBuy: Mitigating Excessive Consumption Through Mobile Social Media

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Advances in Human Factors and Systems Interaction (AHFE 2018)

Part of the book series: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing ((AISC,volume 781))

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Abstract

Excessively consuming essentially futile or unnecessary assets has turned into a true epidemic, at least in the richest and more developed countries in the world. These consuming habits, when excessive, can really lead to serious problems, of psychological nature, therefore converting excessive consumption into an effective public (mental) health problem. We studied the factors that drive people to consume more or less, and the psychologists in our team conducted an empirical study in order to inform the design of novel interactive technologies for mitigating this problem. #LookWhatIDidNotBuy is a new psychological counseling app that promotes the social media sharing of the photos of goods that the user managed not to buy, thus resisting the temptation. The app also provides advice using positive reinforcement, daily challenges, and tips. Our design goes against the dominant narrative of goal-setting apps and goal-setting theory, advocating that sharing the media of goods not bought can induce positive behavior change.

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Acknowledgements

This research was partially funded by Madeira-ITI, through LARSYS, Projeto Estratégico LA9-UID/EEA/50009/2013.

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Correspondence to Arminda Guerra Lopes .

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Campos, P., Soares, L., Moniz, S., Lopes, A.G. (2019). #LookWhatIDidNotBuy: Mitigating Excessive Consumption Through Mobile Social Media. In: Nunes, I. (eds) Advances in Human Factors and Systems Interaction. AHFE 2018. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 781. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94334-3_9

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