Digital Well-Being: How to Live Well with Online Technologies

The Dutch Research School of Philosophy (OZSW) and Eindhoven University of Technology invite PhD candidates in philosophy to register for the course Digital Well-Being: How to Live Well with Online Technologies to take place in September 19-23, 2022.

 

Organizing university

Eindhoven University of Technology

Date(s)

19th to 23rd September 2022, 11:00 to 17:00

Location

University of Amsterdam (Science Park Campus)

Type of activity

5-day PhD-level course

Primary target group

PhD candidates

If places available, also open to

Postdocs, 1st / 2nd year ReMa students. Update August 24: you can register through the link below.

Application/registration deadline

The deadline for registration is September 12, 2022.

About the topic

Digital well-being (DWB) is a contested term. In everyday use, the term relates to the impact of online technologies on the prudential dimension of human flourishing. This 5-session course will examine the key ethical issues pertaining to DWB, aiming to adjudicate between competing normative conceptions of what it is to flourish in the digital age. Participants will be introduced to the key ethical issues relating to DWB, showing how these issues relate to the ethical and societal impact of digital technologies on the good life. Participants will also be introduced to the latest ethical approaches to cultivating DWB (character-based and design-based approaches), as well as exploring the limitations of these theories. This will lead to a discussion on the ethics of repurposing persuasive technologies for DWB. The final session will examine future ethical challenges for DWB in the context of immersive technologies (VR/AR) and the metaverse.

Aim / objective

  • To understand i) what digital well-being is, ii) why it is important, and iii) how this topic connects to other moral/ethical questions in the philosophy of technology.
  • To understand how ethicists can enrich their understanding of digital well-being by empirical studies, especially from disciplines such as HCI and communication science.
  • To understand why ethicists may be able to contribute to improving existing tech-industry initiatives (Google) and tech-NGO initiatives (Center for Humane Technology) on digital well-being.
  • To understand if/how cultural differences inform our conception of digital well-being.
  • To understand how emerging technologies will offer new challenges for digital well-being.

 Key Research Questions

  • How do digital technologies affect our well-being, as well as our moral and/or ethical lives?
  • Why is digital well-being an essential part of 21st century practical life? Which other dimensions of human flourishing are positively or negatively affected by digital technologies?
  • Which virtues/values/capabilities do persuasive technologies stand to undermine?
  • Who is responsible for digital well-being? Users? Designers? Tech companies? Regulators?
  • What kinds of strategies can we use to improve how digital technologies affect well-being?
  • Is digital well-being best understood as an individual or collective problem?
  • How does the digital well-being of individual users affect the social and/or political climate?
  • Do conceptions of digital well-being vary across cultures? If so, how? Are their commonalities?
  • Should we worry about using persuasive technologies to improve the digital well-being of users?

Program

Daily Schedule:

11:00     Opening lecture: Part I
11:45     Break
12:00     Opening lecture: Part II
12:30     Plenary discussion
13:30     Lunch
14:30     Guest lecture
15:30     Plenary discussion
16:00     Break
17:00     Concluding remarks & discussion

SESSION 1: Living Well with Online Technologies

  1. Introductions
  2. Course overview
  3. Rebalancing the ethics of technology
    • Dystopian visions of our future online lives
    • Utopian visions
    • Motivations of users of technology
  4. Identifying the domain of digital well-being
    • Ethical values vs. moral values.
    • Prudential values vs. moral values
  5. How do digital technologies negatively/positively affect well-being?
  6. Which theory of well-being is appropriate?
  7. Methodology
    • Interdisciplinary (normative & descriptive)
    • Transdisciplinary (academic & tech industry partners)

SESSION 2: Key Challenges for Digital Well-Being

  1. Persuasive technologies (nudging & manipulation)
  2. Corporate incentives (vs. whistle-blowers)
  3. Content-creator incentives (attention economy)
  4. Environmental considerations
    • The DWB ecosystem
    • Environmental cost of continual connection

SESSION 3: Strategies to Improve Digital Well-Being

  1. User-based strategies
    • Virtues and capabilities of users
    • Problems with user-based approaches
  2. Designer-based strategies
    • Virtues and capabilities of designers
    • Problems with designer-based approaches
  3. Regulation-based strategies
    • Regulation in US, EU
    • Regulation in China (2019, 2021)
    • Problems with regulation (perfectionism, paternalism)
  4. Evaluating User- / Designer- / Regulation-based strategies

SESSION 4: Repurposing Persuasive Technologies

  1. A Cautionary Tale: B. J. Fogg’s ‘Persuasive Technology Lab’
  2. Value sensitive design
    • Case study I: Google’s Digital Well-Being Values
    • Case study II: Center for Humane Technology
  3. Lessons from self-care apps for DWB
    • Reconsidering techniques of persuasion
    • Reconsidering ethical ideals of self-care apps
    • Scalability

SESSION 5: The Future of Digital Well-Being

  1. The Strength of a Global Approach to DWB
    1. East-Asian Approaches (Confucianism)
    2. South-Asian Approaches (Buddhism)
  1. Wearables: Beyond screens
    1. Aural technologies
    2. Implants
  1. Immersive Technologies
    1. AR
    2. VR & XR
    3. The Metaverse
  2. A New Digital Divide?
    1. Online or offline?
    2. Personal assistants
    3. A new digital underclass

Lecturers

  • Course leader: Matthew J. Dennis (TU/e).
  • Invited guests.
  • Panel presentation with representatives of DWB companies.

Key note speakers

SESSION 1: Living Well with Online Technologies
Dr. Mariek Vanden Abeele (University of Ghent)
Profile: www.ugent.be/en/research/research-ugent/eu-trackrecord/h2020/erc-h2020/disconnect.htm
Award holder (ERC StG): ‘DISCONNECT: Digital Wellbeing in a Culture of Ubiquitous Connectivity’

SESSION 2: Key Challenges for Digital Well-Being
TBC.

SESSION 3: Strategies to Improve Digital Well-Being

  1. Naomi Jacobs (University of Twente) www.people.utwente.nl/n.jacobs
  2. Minha Lee (TU Eindhoven) www.tue.nl/en/research/researchers/minha-lee/
  3. Joey Askew (Fika, UK) www.fika.community
  4. Daan Annemans (Altruïs, BE) www.altruis.be
  5. Jorn Rigter (Unpluq, NL) www.unpluq.com

SESSION 4: Repurposing Persuasive Technologies
Prof. Joel Anderson (Utrecht University)
Profile: www.uu.nl/medewerkers/JHAnderson

SESSION 5: The Future of Digital Well-Being
Dr. Elena Ziliotti (TU Delft)
Profile: www.tudelft.nl/en/tpm/about-the-faculty/departments/values-technology-and-innovation/people/assistant-professors/dr-e-elena-ziliotti

Abstract submission

Abstracts will have to be submitted  by the registration deadline (5th Sept 2022).
Submit the abstracts directly by email: m.j.dennis@tue.nl

Required preparations

Participants will receive a course reader with recommended reading on 1st September.

SESSION 1: Living Well with Online Technologies
Recommended Reading:
* Vallor, S. (2016). ‘Introduction: Envisioning the Good Life in the 21st Century and Beyond’ & ‘Pt. 1: Foundations for a Technomoral Virtue Ethic’ in Technology and the Virtues: A Philosophical Guide to a Future Worth Wanting. Oxford University Press, pp. 1–50.
* Williams, J. (2018). ‘Distraction by Design’ in Stand Out of Our Light: Freedom and Resistance in the Attention Economy. Cambridge University Press, pp. 5–40.

Suggested Reading:
Cocking, D. & J. van den Hoven (2019). Evil Online. Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 1–31.
Véliz, C. (2022). ‘Ch. 1: Data Vultures’ in Privacy is Power: Why and How You Should Take Back Control of Your Data. London: Melville House, pp. 1–15.
Zuboff, S. (2019). ‘Home or Exile in the Digital Future’ in The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power. London: Profile Books, pp. 1–24.

SESSION 2: Key Challenges for Digital Well-Being
Recommended Reading:
* Burr, C. & L. Floridi (eds.) (2020). ‘The Ethics of Digital Well-Being: A Multidisciplinary Perspective’ in Ethics of Digital Well-Being: A Multidisciplinary Approach. Springer, pp. 1–23.
* Fletcher, G. (2016). ‘Introduction’ in The Philosophy of Well-being: An Introduction. London: Routledge, pp. 1–7.

Suggested Reading:
Floridi, L. (2015). ‘Caring for Our Attentional Capabilities’ in The Onlife Manifesto: Being Human in a Hyperconnected Era (4.3). New York: Springer, pp. 12–13.
Peters, D., R. Calvo, R. Ryan (2018). ‘Designing for Motivation, Engagement, and Wellbeing in Digital Experience.’ Frontiers in Psychology, 9. Online first.
Vallor, S. (2016). ‘Moral Attention’ in Technology and the Virtues: A Philosophical Guide to a Future Worth Wanting. Oxford University Press, pp. 99–105.
Watzl, S. (2022). ‘The Ethics of Attention: An Argument and a Framework’, Salience: A Philosophical Inquiry, S. Archer (ed.). New York: Routledge.

SESSION 3: Strategies to Improve Digital Well-Being
Recommended Reading:
* Vallor, S. (2016). ‘Technomoral Wisdom for an Uncertain Future 21st Century Virtues’ in Technology and the Virtues: A Philosophical Guide to a Future Worth Wanting. Oxford University Press, pp. 118–155.

Suggested Reading:
Center for Humane Technology (2022). ‘Take Control Toolkit.’ Available here: www.humanetech.com/take-control
Center for Humane Technology (2022). ‘For Technologists.’ Available here: www.humanetech.com/technologists
Jacobs, N. & W. IJsselsteijn (2021). ‘Bridging the Theory-Practice Gap: Design-Experts on Capability Sensitive Design.’ International Journal of Technoethics, 12 (2), pp. 1–16.

SESSION 4: Repurposing Persuasive Technologies
Recommended Reading:
* Anderson, J. (forthcoming). ‘Scaffolding and Autonomy’ in The Routledge Handbook on Autonomy, B. Colburn (ed.), pp. 1–19. See ‘DWB Course Reader’.
* Nys, T. & B. Engelen (2017). ‘Judging Nudging: Answering the Manipulation Objection’. Political Studies. 65(1): 199–214

Suggested Reading:
Coeckelbergh, M. (2023). Self-Improvement: Technologies of the Soul in the Age of Artificial Intelligence & the Political Philosophy of AI. Columbia University Press, pp. 1–8.
Fogg, B. J. (2003). Persuasive Technology: Using Computers to Change What We Think and Do. New York: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers.
Jongepier, F. & M. Klenk (2022). ‘Online Manipulation: Charting the Field’ in The Philosophy of Online Manipulation. New York: Routledge, pp. 15–49.
Fogg, B. J. (2003). Persuasive Technology: Using Computers to Change What We Think and Do. New York: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers. Introduction & Ch.1.

SESSION 5: The Future of Digital Well-Being
Recommended Reading:
* Arora, P. The Billion Next Users: Digital Life Beyond the West. Harvard University Press, pp. 1–30.
* Wang & Wong (2021). ‘Introduction’ in Harmonious Technology: A Confucian Ethics of Technology. P. H. Wong, T. X. Wang. New York: Routledge.

Suggested Reading:
Hackl, C., D. Lueth, T. Bartolo, J. Arkontaky (2022). Navigating the Metaverse: A Guide to Limitless Possibilities in a Web 3.0 World. New Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell.
Kim, R. (2020). Confucianism and the Philosophy of Well-Being. New York: Routledge.
Norden, B. v., (2017). Taking Back Philosophy: A Multicultural Manifesto. Columbia University Press.

Last updated on August 22, 2022.

Certificate / credit points

For this course participants can earn a certificate after successful completion. Please note, however, that the OZSW is not accredited to reward students with credits/ECTS directly. The study load is mentioned on the certificate, which can usually be exchanged for ‘real’ credits (ECTS) at your home university. For more info please see https://www.ozsw.nl/request-certificate/. The study load for this activity is: 6 ECTS

Costs

 

How to apply / register

PhD candidates, ReMa students, postdocs and others can register through this link.

The deadline for registration is September 12, 2022.

If registration has been closed because the maximum amount of participants has been reached, you can submit your name to the waiting list by sending an email to secretariaat@ozsw.nl. Please also indicate whether you are a ReMa student or PhD candidate and whether you are a member of the OZSW or not.

Cancellation and registration policy

Organizers

Matthew J. Dennis
Contact info: m.j.dennis@tue.nl