Intelligibility and Accountability: Human Considerations in Context-Aware Systems

TLDR

The essay argues that context‑aware systems must consider human aspects of context that cannot be sensed or inferred technologically, requiring systems to defer to users efficiently and non‑obtrusively, especially in architectures where applications are isolated from sensing and inference. The authors propose a design framework to guide the accommodation of human aspects of context in context‑aware systems. The framework outlines four design principles that promote intelligibility of system behavior and accountability of human users, and enumerates human‑salient contextual details that must be incorporated into system design.

Abstract

Abstract This essay considers the problem of defining the context that context-aware systems should pay attention to from a human perspective. In particular, we argue that there are human aspects of context that cannot be sensed or even inferred by technological means, so context-aware systems cannot be designed simply to act on our behalf. Rather, they will have to be able to defer to users in an efficient and nonobtrusive fashion. Our point is particularly relevant for systems that are constructed such that applications are architecturally isolated from the sensing and inferencing that governs their behavior. We propose a design framework that is intended to guide thinking about accommodating human aspects of context. This framework presents four design principles that support intelligibility of system behavior and accountability of human users and a number of human-salient details of context that must be accounted for in context-aware system design.