More actions
No edit summary |
No edit summary |
||
| (5 intermediate revisions by the same user not shown) | |||
| Line 1: | Line 1: | ||
== Context == | == Context == | ||
Human-centred design (HCD) is a central paradigm in interaction design research, teaching, and practice. HCD focuses on the characteristics of the users of the medium or tool being designed, their needs and wants, contexts of usage, and their tasks and workflows. HCD is concerned with learning processes and cognitive stresses and tries to develop products that accommodate humans and are ready-to-hand, promoting user-friendliness, facilitation of workflows, comfort, and a mental state of flow. The successes of HCD philosophies and methodologies, and their role in shaping the current media landscape are undeniable, but they are not without downsides. | Human-centred design (HCD) is a central paradigm in interaction design research, teaching, and practice. HCD focuses on the characteristics of the users of the medium or tool being designed, their needs and wants, contexts of usage, and their tasks and workflows. HCD is concerned with learning processes and cognitive stresses and tries to develop products that accommodate humans and are ready-to-hand, promoting user-friendliness, facilitation of workflows, comfort, and a mental state of flow. The successes of HCD philosophies and methodologies, and their role in shaping the current media landscape are undeniable, but they are not without downsides. | ||
The application of HCD methods can result in media and tools that are conducive to hedonistic loops — the optimisation and normalisation of what is already known and familiar to users — and to the overuse of strategies and patterns that exploit computational media’s potential for persuasiveness. This may result in diminished critical thinking and metacognition in users. Mistaking usability with effortlessness can lead to negative impacts on diversity and to increases in radicalisation, as well as to a dilution of the ergodic potential, impairing the creation of meaning and the development of creative processes, as well as increasing alienation, something which is paradoxically opposed to one of the main goals of flow theory. Ultimately, HCD’s methods can incentivise shallow relationships with digital media and other humans, leading to unreflected interactions and convergent thinking. | The application of HCD methods can result in media and tools that are conducive to hedonistic loops — the optimisation and normalisation of what is already known and familiar to users — and to the overuse of strategies and patterns that exploit computational media’s potential for persuasiveness. This may result in diminished critical thinking and metacognition in users. Mistaking usability with effortlessness can lead to negative impacts on diversity and to increases in radicalisation, as well as to a dilution of the ergodic potential, impairing the creation of meaning and the development of creative processes, as well as increasing alienation, something which is paradoxically opposed to one of the main goals of flow theory. Ultimately, HCD’s methods can incentivise shallow relationships with digital media and other humans, leading to unreflected interactions and convergent thinking. | ||
Interaction design’s influence on most human activities is paramount. The way computational tools and media are designed increasingly impacts what we are able to create with and for them due to their affordances and how they expand human creativity. | Interaction design’s influence on most human activities is paramount. The way computational tools and media are designed increasingly impacts what we are able to create with and for them due to their affordances and how they expand human creativity. | ||
Examples can be found in how generative artificial intelligence systems are brought to creative software and how algorithms mediate interactions on social networks and digital media, with impacts on culture, politics, ecology, and a growing number of other fronts. This research intends to expand the methods available to HCD and to develop tools for countering these shortcomings. | Examples can be found in how generative artificial intelligence systems are brought to creative software and how algorithms mediate interactions on social networks and digital media, with impacts on culture, politics, ecology, and a growing number of other fronts. This research intends to expand the methods available to HCD and to develop tools for countering these shortcomings. | ||
==Break The Loop Research Project== | ==Break The Loop Research Project== | ||
This project intends to bring contributions from other disciplines, chiefly game design, to interaction design. Game design often suffers from excessive facilitation and the commodification of flow”, but it is a field where these negative effects have a far more direct impact on the quality of products. As such, there is a growing body of research focused on inconvenient play, transgressive and no-fun games, abusive game design, and other strategies to induce friction in games and to lead to increases in meaningfulness and the quality of experience. Relevant bodies of research are also being developed in fields adjacent to interaction and game design, such as computational arts, electronic literature, or digital narrative. | This project intends to bring contributions from other disciplines, chiefly game design, to interaction design. Game design often suffers from excessive facilitation and the commodification of flow”, but it is a field where these negative effects have a far more direct impact on the quality of products. As such, there is a growing body of research focused on inconvenient play, transgressive and no-fun games, abusive game design, and other strategies to induce friction in games and to lead to increases in meaningfulness and the quality of experience. Relevant bodies of research are also being developed in fields adjacent to interaction and game design, such as computational arts, electronic literature, or digital narrative. | ||
This project’s main research question is: How can friction, inconvenience, and playful strategies stemming from game design be used in interaction design as inducers of meaning, reflectiveness and higher-order thinking by users? Secondary questions include: How can flow be constructively interrupted and moderated through the use of friction in the interaction with digital media? What are the purposes for breaking flow in digital media? What kinds of teaching and learning materials can be developed for these methods? | This project’s main research question is: How can friction, inconvenience, and playful strategies stemming from game design be used in interaction design as inducers of meaning, reflectiveness and higher-order thinking by users? Secondary questions include: How can flow be constructively interrupted and moderated through the use of friction in the interaction with digital media? What are the purposes for breaking flow in digital media? What kinds of teaching and learning materials can be developed for these methods? | ||
This website intends to archive current discourses and practices, providing updated knowledge on theories, models, methods, frameworks, strategies, principles, patterns, or tools, for countering these shortcomings. The focus of the site is on strategies to induce friction in the interaction with computational systems and how this may lead to increases in meaningfulness and the quality of experience with computational artefacts. | This website intends to archive current discourses and practices, providing updated knowledge on theories, models, methods, frameworks, strategies, principles, patterns, or tools, for countering these shortcomings. The focus of the site is on strategies to induce friction in the interaction with computational systems and how this may lead to increases in meaningfulness and the quality of experience with computational artefacts. | ||
<b>Keywords</b>: Interaction Design; Game Design; User Experience; Design Education and Training. | <b>Keywords</b>: Interaction Design; Game Design; User Experience; Design Education and Training. | ||
<b>doi</b>: https://doi.org/10.54499/2023.14448.PEX | <b>doi</b>: https://doi.org/10.54499/2023.14448.PEX | ||
[https://i2ads.up.pt/en/projetos/btl/ i2ADS Project Page] | [https://i2ads.up.pt/en/projetos/btl/ i2ADS Project Page] | ||
==Project Outputs== | ==Project Outputs== | ||
| Line 28: | Line 34: | ||
<b>EVENTS</b> | <b>EVENTS</b> | ||
“Play as Method” Master Class by Miguel Sicart (Think Tank #1) | 4 December 2025 [Porto, PT] | “Play as Method” Master Class by Miguel Sicart (Think Tank #1) | 4 December 2025 [Porto, PT] | ||
“Monetisation of Characters in Gacha Games” Lecture by Joleen Blom | 2 March 2026 [Porto, PT] | “Monetisation of Characters in Gacha Games” Lecture by Joleen Blom | 2 March 2026 [Porto, PT] | ||
[https://frictiondesign.fba.up.pt/unloop/ UNLOOP 2026: Symposium on Interaction and Computational Media Design] (Think Tank #2) | 26 June 2026 [Porto, PT], with the Keynote Address by Laura Belloff titled “Chickens and Bones: from Fossils to Algorithms” | [https://frictiondesign.fba.up.pt/unloop/ UNLOOP 2026: Symposium on Interaction and Computational Media Design] (Think Tank #2) | 26 June 2026 [Porto, PT], with the Keynote Address by Laura Belloff titled “Chickens and Bones: from Fossils to Algorithms” | ||
| Line 38: | Line 47: | ||
<b>CONFERENCE PAPERS</b> | <b>CONFERENCE PAPERS</b> | ||
Pedro Cardoso, Miguel Carvalhais, Eliana Santiago, Fabrício Fava and Henrique Miguel. 2026. “Friction Design Archive: An Online Collection.” Breaking the Code: Hacktivating Non-Normative Algorithms, Porto, Portugal. | Pedro Cardoso, Miguel Carvalhais, Eliana Santiago, Fabrício Fava and Henrique Miguel. 2026. “Friction Design Archive: An Online Collection.”<i>Breaking the Code: Hacktivating Non-Normative Algorithms</i>, Porto, Portugal. | ||
Henrique Miguel, Fabrício Fava, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago and Miguel Carvalhais. 2026. “From Games to Interfaces: An Archive of Friction Approaches for Interaction Design.” <i>Intermediartes: International Conference on Media, Arts and Interaction,</i> Vila do Conde. | |||
Henrique Miguel, Fabrício Fava, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago and Miguel Carvalhais. 2026. “An Open Access Database of Friction Design Patterns.” Space to Space: 1st International Conference on Design, Animation & Media, Faro, Portugal. | |||
Eliana Santiago, Pedro Cardoso, Pedro Sá Couto, Fabrício Fava and Miguel Carvalhais. 2026. “Against Seamlessness and Hedonistic Loops: The Cases of Pause, Reflect, Resist, and Reform, from Interaction Design into Games.” <i>DiGRA 2026 Conference: Intersectional Pleasures</i>, Maynooth, Ireland. | |||
Henrique Miguel, Fabrício Fava, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago and Miguel Carvalhais. 2026. “An Open Access Database of Friction Design Patterns.” <i>Space to Space: 1st International Conference on Design, Animation & Media</i>, Faro, Portugal. | |||
<b>JOURNAL PAPERS</b> | <b>JOURNAL PAPERS</b> | ||
Something Went Right: Friction Design as an Aesthetic Strategy Towards User Intention Instead of User Retention. IJFMA. Submitted. https://revistas.ulusofona.pt/index.php/ijfma/announcement/view/239 | Something Went Right: Friction Design as an Aesthetic Strategy Towards User Intention Instead of User Retention. IJFMA. Submitted. https://revistas.ulusofona.pt/index.php/ijfma/announcement/view/239 | ||
| Line 54: | Line 67: | ||
<b>EDITED PUBLICATIONS</b> | <b>EDITED PUBLICATIONS</b> | ||
Carvalhais, Miguel, and Pedro Cardoso. 2027. Friction in Computational Media: A Glossary of Possible Futures [Forthcoming on U.Porto Press] | Carvalhais, Miguel, and Pedro Cardoso. 2027. <i>Friction in Computational Media: A Glossary of Possible Futures</i>[Forthcoming on U.Porto Press] | ||
Carvalhais, Miguel, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago, Fabrício Fava, eds. 2027. <i>Break the UNLOOP: Friction in Interaction and Computational Media Design.</i> JDMI special issue [Forthcoming on Journal of Digital Media & Interaction] | |||
Carvalhais, Miguel, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago, Fabrício Fava, eds. | Carvalhais, Miguel, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago, and Fabrício Fava, eds. 2026. <i>UNLOOP 2026: Book of Abstracts of the Symposium on Interaction and Computational Media Design</i>. Porto, Portugal: i2ADS—Research Institute in Art, Design and Society. https://doi.org/10.34626/2026/9r94-sx78. | ||
Carvalhais, Miguel and Pedro Cardoso. 2025. “Friction in Games and Computational Media (Editorial)” Journal of Digital Media & Interaction 8 (20):5–10. https://doi.org/10.34624/jdmi.v8i20.42275. | Carvalhais, Miguel and Pedro Cardoso. 2025. “Friction in Games and Computational Media (Editorial)” <i>Journal of Digital Media & Interaction</i> 8 (20):5–10. https://doi.org/10.34624/jdmi.v8i20.42275. | ||
<b>MASTER DISSERTATIONS SUPERVISED</b> | <b>MASTER DISSERTATIONS SUPERVISED</b> | ||
Gurpreet Kaur, Designing Sonic Friction for Reflective Interaction in Digital Media (provisional title). 2025-2026. Dissertation (Masters in Multimedia) – Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (supervised by Fabrício Fava and Pedro Cardoso). | Gurpreet Kaur, <i>Designing Sonic Friction for Reflective Interaction in Digital Media</i>(provisional title). 2025-2026. Dissertation (Masters in Multimedia) – Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (supervised by Fabrício Fava and Pedro Cardoso). | ||
Beatriz Reis,<i>Micro-narrativas para o disengagement em media digitais</i> (provisional title). 2025-2026. Dissertation (Masters in Multimedia) – Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (supervised by Eliana Santiago and Pedro Cardoso). | |||
Sofia Silva,<i>Microinterações para o disengagement em interfaces digitais</i> (provisional title). 2025-2026. Dissertation (Masters in Multimedia) – Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (supervised by Eliana Santiago and Pedro Cardoso). | |||
José Santos,<i>The Game that Lies: A Study on Deceptive Game Design Patterns.</i> 2024-2025. Dissertation (Masters in Digital Game Development) - University of Aveiro (supervised by Mário Vairinhos and Pedro Cardoso). | |||
Duarte Cunha,<i>Affordances in Visual-Focused Game Mechanics as Tools to Subvert Player Perception in 2D Platformers.</i> 2024-2025. Dissertation (Masters in Digital Game Development) - University of Aveiro (supervised by Mário Vairinhos and Pedro Cardoso). | |||
<b>PHD DISSERTATIONS SUPERVISED</b> | |||
Since 2025, Isabella Silva, “Design Friction in User Interfaces to Support AI–Human Alignment” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Design) – University of Porto + University of Aveiro. (Supervision: Pedro Cardoso + Duarte Folgado). | Since 2025, Isabella Silva, “Design Friction in User Interfaces to Support AI–Human Alignment” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Design) – University of Porto + University of Aveiro. (Supervision: Pedro Cardoso + Duarte Folgado). | ||
Since 2025, Maria Isabel Quaresma, “There Is Nothing Fun Here: Friction in the Playful Space as Reflection and Resistance for Democracy” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Design) – University of Porto + University of Aveiro. (Supervision: Pedro Cardoso). | Since 2025, Maria Isabel Quaresma, “There Is Nothing Fun Here: Friction in the Playful Space as Reflection and Resistance for Democracy” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Design) – University of Porto + University of Aveiro. (Supervision: Pedro Cardoso). | ||
Since 2025, Rita Malaquias, “Deception in Video Games: A Framework for Game Design” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Digital Games Development) – IADE, Faculty of Design, Technology and Communication / European University; IPCA + Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave. (Supervision: Pamela Teubig + Eva Oliveira + Pedro Cardoso). | Since 2025, Rita Malaquias, “Deception in Video Games: A Framework for Game Design” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Digital Games Development) – IADE, Faculty of Design, Technology and Communication / European University; IPCA + Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave. (Supervision: Pamela Teubig + Eva Oliveira + Pedro Cardoso). | ||
| Line 88: | Line 111: | ||
Workshop on Friction Design Methods with Pedro Cardoso and Henrique Miguel. <i>Thursdays with Science Session</i> @ Fraunhofer AICOS | 12 March 2026 [Porto, PT] | Workshop on Friction Design Methods with Pedro Cardoso and Henrique Miguel. <i>Thursdays with Science Session</i> @ Fraunhofer AICOS | 12 March 2026 [Porto, PT] | ||
Workshop on Friction Design with Lara Portelinha @ FBAUP | 22 June 2026 [Porto, PT] | Workshop on Friction Design with Lara Portelinha @ FBAUP | 22 June 2026 [Porto, PT] | ||
| Line 94: | Line 118: | ||
<b>COMMUNICATIONS</b> | <b>COMMUNICATIONS</b> | ||
Cardoso, Pedro. “Aesthetic Friction in Game Design.” Keynote Presentation. ETD25: 11th Ergotrip Design Conference. Aveiro, Portugal. 3 December, 2025. https://ergotrip25.web.ua.pt/en/programa/ | Cardoso, Pedro. “Aesthetic Friction in Game Design.” Keynote Presentation.<i> ETD25: 11th Ergotrip Design Conference.</i> Aveiro, Portugal. 3 December, 2025. https://ergotrip25.web.ua.pt/en/programa/ | ||
Cardoso, Pedro. “From Friction in the Design of Play to Breaking the Loop in Non-Game Contexts.” <i>Thursdays with Science Session</i> at Fraunhofer AICOS. Porto, Portugal. 12 March 2026. | |||
Santiago, Eliana. 2026. “Friction Design Archive: An Online Collection.”<i> Breaking the Code: Hacktivating Non-Normative Algorithms</i>, Porto, Portugal. 19 June 2026. | |||
Fava, Fabrício. 2026. “From Games to Interfaces: An Archive of Friction Approaches for Interaction Design.” <i>Intermediartes: International Conference on Media, Arts and Interaction</i>, Vila do Conde. 21 May 2026. | |||
Fava, Fabrício. 2026. “Against Seamlessness and Hedonistic Loops: The Cases of Pause, Reflect, Resist, and Reform, from Interaction Design into Games.”<i>DiGRA 2026 Conference: Intersectional Pleasures</i>, Maynooth, Ireland. 18 June 2026 | |||
Miguel, Henrique. 2026. “An Open Access Database of Friction Design Patterns.” <i>Space to Space: 1st International Conference on Design, Animation & Media</i>, Faro, Portugal. 22 May 2026. https://algarvedesignmeeting.ualg.pt/conference/ | |||
==Participating Institutions== | ==Participating Institutions== | ||
Institute for Research in Art, Design and Society (i2ADS), FBAUP - Leader <br> | Institute for Research in Art, Design and Society (i2ADS), FBAUP - Leader <br> | ||
Centro de Investigação em Média Digitais e Interação (DigiMedia), UA | Centro de Investigação em Média Digitais e Interação (DigiMedia), UA | ||
==Team== | ==Team== | ||
Latest revision as of 22:01, 15 July 2026
Context
Human-centred design (HCD) is a central paradigm in interaction design research, teaching, and practice. HCD focuses on the characteristics of the users of the medium or tool being designed, their needs and wants, contexts of usage, and their tasks and workflows. HCD is concerned with learning processes and cognitive stresses and tries to develop products that accommodate humans and are ready-to-hand, promoting user-friendliness, facilitation of workflows, comfort, and a mental state of flow. The successes of HCD philosophies and methodologies, and their role in shaping the current media landscape are undeniable, but they are not without downsides.
The application of HCD methods can result in media and tools that are conducive to hedonistic loops — the optimisation and normalisation of what is already known and familiar to users — and to the overuse of strategies and patterns that exploit computational media’s potential for persuasiveness. This may result in diminished critical thinking and metacognition in users. Mistaking usability with effortlessness can lead to negative impacts on diversity and to increases in radicalisation, as well as to a dilution of the ergodic potential, impairing the creation of meaning and the development of creative processes, as well as increasing alienation, something which is paradoxically opposed to one of the main goals of flow theory. Ultimately, HCD’s methods can incentivise shallow relationships with digital media and other humans, leading to unreflected interactions and convergent thinking.
Interaction design’s influence on most human activities is paramount. The way computational tools and media are designed increasingly impacts what we are able to create with and for them due to their affordances and how they expand human creativity.
Examples can be found in how generative artificial intelligence systems are brought to creative software and how algorithms mediate interactions on social networks and digital media, with impacts on culture, politics, ecology, and a growing number of other fronts. This research intends to expand the methods available to HCD and to develop tools for countering these shortcomings.
Break The Loop Research Project
This project intends to bring contributions from other disciplines, chiefly game design, to interaction design. Game design often suffers from excessive facilitation and the commodification of flow”, but it is a field where these negative effects have a far more direct impact on the quality of products. As such, there is a growing body of research focused on inconvenient play, transgressive and no-fun games, abusive game design, and other strategies to induce friction in games and to lead to increases in meaningfulness and the quality of experience. Relevant bodies of research are also being developed in fields adjacent to interaction and game design, such as computational arts, electronic literature, or digital narrative.
This project’s main research question is: How can friction, inconvenience, and playful strategies stemming from game design be used in interaction design as inducers of meaning, reflectiveness and higher-order thinking by users? Secondary questions include: How can flow be constructively interrupted and moderated through the use of friction in the interaction with digital media? What are the purposes for breaking flow in digital media? What kinds of teaching and learning materials can be developed for these methods?
This website intends to archive current discourses and practices, providing updated knowledge on theories, models, methods, frameworks, strategies, principles, patterns, or tools, for countering these shortcomings. The focus of the site is on strategies to induce friction in the interaction with computational systems and how this may lead to increases in meaningfulness and the quality of experience with computational artefacts.
Keywords: Interaction Design; Game Design; User Experience; Design Education and Training.
doi: https://doi.org/10.54499/2023.14448.PEX
Project Outputs
EVENTS
“Play as Method” Master Class by Miguel Sicart (Think Tank #1) | 4 December 2025 [Porto, PT]
“Monetisation of Characters in Gacha Games” Lecture by Joleen Blom | 2 March 2026 [Porto, PT]
UNLOOP 2026: Symposium on Interaction and Computational Media Design (Think Tank #2) | 26 June 2026 [Porto, PT], with the Keynote Address by Laura Belloff titled “Chickens and Bones: from Fossils to Algorithms”
CONFERENCE PAPERS
Pedro Cardoso, Miguel Carvalhais, Eliana Santiago, Fabrício Fava and Henrique Miguel. 2026. “Friction Design Archive: An Online Collection.”Breaking the Code: Hacktivating Non-Normative Algorithms, Porto, Portugal.
Henrique Miguel, Fabrício Fava, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago and Miguel Carvalhais. 2026. “From Games to Interfaces: An Archive of Friction Approaches for Interaction Design.” Intermediartes: International Conference on Media, Arts and Interaction, Vila do Conde.
Eliana Santiago, Pedro Cardoso, Pedro Sá Couto, Fabrício Fava and Miguel Carvalhais. 2026. “Against Seamlessness and Hedonistic Loops: The Cases of Pause, Reflect, Resist, and Reform, from Interaction Design into Games.” DiGRA 2026 Conference: Intersectional Pleasures, Maynooth, Ireland.
Henrique Miguel, Fabrício Fava, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago and Miguel Carvalhais. 2026. “An Open Access Database of Friction Design Patterns.” Space to Space: 1st International Conference on Design, Animation & Media, Faro, Portugal.
JOURNAL PAPERS
Something Went Right: Friction Design as an Aesthetic Strategy Towards User Intention Instead of User Retention. IJFMA. Submitted. https://revistas.ulusofona.pt/index.php/ijfma/announcement/view/239
EDITED PUBLICATIONS
Carvalhais, Miguel, and Pedro Cardoso. 2027. Friction in Computational Media: A Glossary of Possible Futures[Forthcoming on U.Porto Press]
Carvalhais, Miguel, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago, Fabrício Fava, eds. 2027. Break the UNLOOP: Friction in Interaction and Computational Media Design. JDMI special issue [Forthcoming on Journal of Digital Media & Interaction]
Carvalhais, Miguel, Pedro Cardoso, Eliana Santiago, and Fabrício Fava, eds. 2026. UNLOOP 2026: Book of Abstracts of the Symposium on Interaction and Computational Media Design. Porto, Portugal: i2ADS—Research Institute in Art, Design and Society. https://doi.org/10.34626/2026/9r94-sx78.
Carvalhais, Miguel and Pedro Cardoso. 2025. “Friction in Games and Computational Media (Editorial)” Journal of Digital Media & Interaction 8 (20):5–10. https://doi.org/10.34624/jdmi.v8i20.42275.
MASTER DISSERTATIONS SUPERVISED
Gurpreet Kaur, Designing Sonic Friction for Reflective Interaction in Digital Media(provisional title). 2025-2026. Dissertation (Masters in Multimedia) – Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (supervised by Fabrício Fava and Pedro Cardoso).
Beatriz Reis,Micro-narrativas para o disengagement em media digitais (provisional title). 2025-2026. Dissertation (Masters in Multimedia) – Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (supervised by Eliana Santiago and Pedro Cardoso).
Sofia Silva,Microinterações para o disengagement em interfaces digitais (provisional title). 2025-2026. Dissertation (Masters in Multimedia) – Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (supervised by Eliana Santiago and Pedro Cardoso).
José Santos,The Game that Lies: A Study on Deceptive Game Design Patterns. 2024-2025. Dissertation (Masters in Digital Game Development) - University of Aveiro (supervised by Mário Vairinhos and Pedro Cardoso).
Duarte Cunha,Affordances in Visual-Focused Game Mechanics as Tools to Subvert Player Perception in 2D Platformers. 2024-2025. Dissertation (Masters in Digital Game Development) - University of Aveiro (supervised by Mário Vairinhos and Pedro Cardoso).
PHD DISSERTATIONS SUPERVISED
Since 2025, Isabella Silva, “Design Friction in User Interfaces to Support AI–Human Alignment” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Design) – University of Porto + University of Aveiro. (Supervision: Pedro Cardoso + Duarte Folgado).
Since 2025, Maria Isabel Quaresma, “There Is Nothing Fun Here: Friction in the Playful Space as Reflection and Resistance for Democracy” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Design) – University of Porto + University of Aveiro. (Supervision: Pedro Cardoso).
Since 2025, Rita Malaquias, “Deception in Video Games: A Framework for Game Design” (provisional title). Doctoral Dissertation (Doctoral Program in Digital Games Development) – IADE, Faculty of Design, Technology and Communication / European University; IPCA + Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave. (Supervision: Pamela Teubig + Eva Oliveira + Pedro Cardoso).
WORKSHOPS
Workshop on Friction Design Methods with Pedro Cardoso and Henrique Miguel. Thursdays with Science Session @ Fraunhofer AICOS | 12 March 2026 [Porto, PT]
Workshop on Friction Design with Lara Portelinha @ FBAUP | 22 June 2026 [Porto, PT]
COMMUNICATIONS
Cardoso, Pedro. “Aesthetic Friction in Game Design.” Keynote Presentation. ETD25: 11th Ergotrip Design Conference. Aveiro, Portugal. 3 December, 2025. https://ergotrip25.web.ua.pt/en/programa/
Cardoso, Pedro. “From Friction in the Design of Play to Breaking the Loop in Non-Game Contexts.” Thursdays with Science Session at Fraunhofer AICOS. Porto, Portugal. 12 March 2026.
Santiago, Eliana. 2026. “Friction Design Archive: An Online Collection.” Breaking the Code: Hacktivating Non-Normative Algorithms, Porto, Portugal. 19 June 2026.
Fava, Fabrício. 2026. “From Games to Interfaces: An Archive of Friction Approaches for Interaction Design.” Intermediartes: International Conference on Media, Arts and Interaction, Vila do Conde. 21 May 2026.
Fava, Fabrício. 2026. “Against Seamlessness and Hedonistic Loops: The Cases of Pause, Reflect, Resist, and Reform, from Interaction Design into Games.”DiGRA 2026 Conference: Intersectional Pleasures, Maynooth, Ireland. 18 June 2026
Miguel, Henrique. 2026. “An Open Access Database of Friction Design Patterns.” Space to Space: 1st International Conference on Design, Animation & Media, Faro, Portugal. 22 May 2026. https://algarvedesignmeeting.ualg.pt/conference/
Participating Institutions
Institute for Research in Art, Design and Society (i2ADS), FBAUP - Leader
Centro de Investigação em Média Digitais e Interação (DigiMedia), UA