Dushani Perera: Use of Data Sculpture to Encourage Sustainable Practices by Visualising Household Consumption Household consumption significantly impacts climate change. Although interventions that make households aware of their consumption exist, tailoring the design to each home's needs remains challenging. To address this, I applied a Human Centred Design approach, utilising surveys, household interviews and design workshops, which informed the iterative design and deployment of an eco-feedback system, Eco-Garden - a physical data sculpture and a companion mobile app to visualise household electricity consumption, gas consumption and food waste data, aiming to promote sustainable practices. Eco-Garden serves as both an aesthetic piece for visitors and a functional tool for household members to understand their resource consumption. Findings of this research highlight several insights. First, abstract metrics such as carbon emissions are often difficult for households to interpret and relate to daily practices. Second, sustainable action is mediated by the complex dynamics of a household engagement with eco-feedback systems is often short-lived. I identified ways to gain interest through intrinsic motivation, goal-setting, aesthetic appeal, child-friendly design, and contextual integration into household environments. Our Insights contribute to developing data sculptures for households that can facilitate meaningful interactions with consumption data.BioDushani Perera is a qualitative researcher focusing on the intersection of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW), and Social Sciences with a particular interest in Sustainability, Information Visualisation, and Data Physicalization domains. She works as a Research Associate in the Grasping Data project, exploring ways to physicalize children's personal data. Dushani's PhD research in HCI at Cardiff University, UK, is focused on exploring the design of data physicalizations to visualise household consumption data to encourage sustainable practices at homes. Previously, she worked as an Assistant Lecturer at the University of Colombo School of Computing in Sri Lanka, where she earned her degree in Bachelor of Honours in Software Engineering.Joining onlineYou will receive the details to log into the call in a confirmation message from Eventbrite after you have registered successfully. If you don't see that message, please check your spam folder or contact us at MHSES-REI-Events@ed.ac.uk.For any enquiries concerning this event, please email MHSES-REI-Events@ed.ac.ukPrivacy policy Tags Digital Education Research centres, groups and networks Research events Conferences, seminars and lectures Feb 10 2026 14.00 - 15.00 Dushani Perera: Use of Data Sculpture to Encourage Sustainable Practices by Visualising Household Consumption The seminar shares insights on the design of an eco-feedback system to facilitate meaningful interactions with household consumption data. Online event Book free tickets on Eventbrite
Dushani Perera: Use of Data Sculpture to Encourage Sustainable Practices by Visualising Household Consumption Household consumption significantly impacts climate change. Although interventions that make households aware of their consumption exist, tailoring the design to each home's needs remains challenging. To address this, I applied a Human Centred Design approach, utilising surveys, household interviews and design workshops, which informed the iterative design and deployment of an eco-feedback system, Eco-Garden - a physical data sculpture and a companion mobile app to visualise household electricity consumption, gas consumption and food waste data, aiming to promote sustainable practices. Eco-Garden serves as both an aesthetic piece for visitors and a functional tool for household members to understand their resource consumption. Findings of this research highlight several insights. First, abstract metrics such as carbon emissions are often difficult for households to interpret and relate to daily practices. Second, sustainable action is mediated by the complex dynamics of a household engagement with eco-feedback systems is often short-lived. I identified ways to gain interest through intrinsic motivation, goal-setting, aesthetic appeal, child-friendly design, and contextual integration into household environments. Our Insights contribute to developing data sculptures for households that can facilitate meaningful interactions with consumption data.BioDushani Perera is a qualitative researcher focusing on the intersection of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW), and Social Sciences with a particular interest in Sustainability, Information Visualisation, and Data Physicalization domains. She works as a Research Associate in the Grasping Data project, exploring ways to physicalize children's personal data. Dushani's PhD research in HCI at Cardiff University, UK, is focused on exploring the design of data physicalizations to visualise household consumption data to encourage sustainable practices at homes. Previously, she worked as an Assistant Lecturer at the University of Colombo School of Computing in Sri Lanka, where she earned her degree in Bachelor of Honours in Software Engineering.Joining onlineYou will receive the details to log into the call in a confirmation message from Eventbrite after you have registered successfully. If you don't see that message, please check your spam folder or contact us at MHSES-REI-Events@ed.ac.uk.For any enquiries concerning this event, please email MHSES-REI-Events@ed.ac.ukPrivacy policy Tags Digital Education Research centres, groups and networks Research events Conferences, seminars and lectures Feb 10 2026 14.00 - 15.00 Dushani Perera: Use of Data Sculpture to Encourage Sustainable Practices by Visualising Household Consumption The seminar shares insights on the design of an eco-feedback system to facilitate meaningful interactions with household consumption data. Online event Book free tickets on Eventbrite
Feb 10 2026 14.00 - 15.00 Dushani Perera: Use of Data Sculpture to Encourage Sustainable Practices by Visualising Household Consumption The seminar shares insights on the design of an eco-feedback system to facilitate meaningful interactions with household consumption data.
