Networks of Practices: Exploring Design Opportunities for Interconnected Practices

Abstract

For over a decade, researchers from the practice-centered computing community are taking social practices as a unit of design. While the first generation focused on a social practice in isolation, more recent work argues for the (inter-)connections of mutually influencing practices as the primary unit of design. We discuss these current approaches to motivate the notion of a network of practices. Utilizing the case of food practices, we construct and analyze a network populated by the answers of 60 participants. Based on this network we suggest how to identify central elements and clusters as well as points for intervention within the overall network, but also within and in-between clusters of practices. Based on this, our work critically discusses how an understanding of practices as a network could improve practice-based research and design.