Do humans response socially to abstract, expres­sive human-computer interfaces?

To inter­act with the Sympathetic Guitar is to use a famil­iar and com­fort­able Western musi­cal inter­face to feel an instant con­nec­tion to musi­cal cul­ture and style of the East.  The pro­to­type senses gui­tarists’ hand motions and per­for­mance dynam­ics to aug­ment a stan­dard clas­si­cal guitar with a dig­i­tal drone resem­bling the res­onat­ing strings of an Indian sitar.

The project con­nects my own musi­cal expres­sion to an alter­nate real­ity where my par­ents never immi­grated from India, an alter­nate real­ity where my inspi­ra­tion would likely have come from the musi­cal cul­ture of my ances­tral home.  Beyond musi­cal and eth­no­log­i­cal explo­ration, this piece was also used to sci­en­tif­i­cally inves­ti­gate whether abstract, expres­sive inter­faces are social forms of inter­ac­tive media.  Inspired by cog­ni­tive the­o­ries of social inter­ac­tion and inter­dis­ci­pli­nary per­spec­tives of immer­sion, this piece attempts to “per­ceive” the expres­sion of users in a way which causes them to respond socially, a response which demands sym­pa­thy for inan­i­mate com­puter technology.

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