Human-Food Interaction

Book excerpt: Food is not only fundamental to our existence, its consumption, handling or even the mere sight of its also brings us immense joy. Over the years, technology has played a crucial part in supporting and enriching food-related practices, beginning from how we grow, to how we cook, eat and dispose of food. All these practices have a significant impact not only on individuals but also on the surrounding ecologies and infrastructures, often discussed under the umbrella term of Human-Food Interaction (HFI). This monograph provides an overview of the existing research in this space and a guide to further its exploration. The authors illustrate the growth in research across four phases of HFI, namely, Growing, Cooking, Eating and Disposal; categorizing the existing works across each of these phases to reveal a rich design space and that highlights the underexplored areas that interaction designers might find intriguing to investigate. Human-Food Interaction offers a first of its kind overview of research in this fascinating interdisciplinary field and will be of interest to students and researchers working in many areas of Human-Computer Interaction.