SomaFlatables: Supporting Embodied Cognition through Pneumatic Bladders Aryan Saini Haotian Huang Rakesh Patibanda aryan@exertiongameslab.org haotian@exertiongameslab.org rakesh@exertiongameslab.org Exertion Games Lab, Department of Exertion Games Lab, Department of Exertion Games Lab, Department of Human-Centred Computing, Human-Centred Computing, Human-Centred Computing, Monash University Monash University Monash University Melbourne, Australia Melbourne, Australia Melbourne, Australia Nathalie Overdevest Elise van den Hoven Florian ‘Floyd’ Mueller nathalie@exertiongameslab.org elise.vandenhoven@uts.edu.au foyd@exertiongameslab.org Exertion Games Lab, Department of University of Technology Sydney Exertion Games Lab, Department of Human-Centred Computing, Sydney, Australia Human-Centred Computing, Monash University Eindhoven University of Technology Monash University Melbourne, Australia Eindhoven, Netherlands Melbourne, Australia Figure 1: The two application scenarios in which SomaFlatables are used: A: “Pardon": This application consists of bladder placed behind the user’s ear which when infated makes the ear bigger and moves it forward; B: “Bye-Bye": This application consists of the bladder attached to the user’s palm which when infated opens up their hand to signal bye. ABSTRACT Applying the theory of Embodied Cognition through design allows us to create computational interactions that engage our bodies by modifying our body schema. However, in HCI, most of these interac- tive experiences have been stationed around creating sensing-based systems that leverage our body’s position and movement to ofer an experience, such as games using Nintendo Wii and Xbox Kinect. In this work, we created two pneumatic infatables-based proto- types that actuate our body to support embodied cognition in two scenarios by altering the user’s body schema. We call these "So- maFlatables" and demonstrate the design and implementation of Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for proft or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the frst page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the owner/author(s). UIST ’22 Adjunct, October 29-November 2, 2022, Bend, OR, USA © 2022 Copyright held by the owner/author(s). ACM ISBN 978-1-4503-9321-8/22/10. https://doi.org/10.1145/3526114.3558705 these infatables based prototypes that can move and even extend our bodies, allowing for novel bodily experiences. Furthermore, we discuss the future work and limitations of the current implementa- tion. CCS CONCEPTS • Human-centered computing → Interaction devices; HCI theory, concepts and models; Interaction paradigms. KEYWORDS Pneumatics, Infatables, Body Actuation, Embodied Cognition, Body Schema ACM Reference Format: Aryan Saini, Haotian Huang, Rakesh Patibanda, Nathalie Overdevest, Elise van den Hoven, and Florian ‘Floyd’ Mueller. 2022. SomaFlatables: Supporting Embodied Cognition through Pneumatic Bladders. In The Adjunct Publi- cation of the 35th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST ’22 Adjunct), October 29-November 2, 2022, Bend, OR, USA. ACM, New York, NY, USA, 4 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3526114.3558705