Persuasive technology for human well-being

Can computers help fight obesity? Can technology motivate you to waste less energy? Can communication devices help overcome racial prejudice? Can a virtual agent persuade you to break your smoking habit? Can a mobile phone help you study? Can a robot challenge you to perform rehabilitation exercises?

The PERSUASIVE 06 conference is aimed at exploring technology in the service of human well-being, within the broader context of a socially and ecologically sustainable society. Academic researchers, designers and technology developers from around the world will be investigating the potential of persuasive technologies to positively affect human attitudes and behaviour.

The goal of PERSUASIVE 06 is to bring together a multidisciplinary group of social scientists studying persuasion, and engineers developing persuasive technologies in areas such as health and rehabilitation, housing, information and communication, and energy conservation, so they can meet, share experiences, present research and exchange ideas.

Keynote speaker is B.J. Fogg, author of Persuasive Technology – Using Computers to Change What We Think and Do, and director of Stanford University’s Persuasive Technology Lab.

The conference will take place on 18 and 19 May 2006 at the Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands.