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Pers Ubiquit Comput

DOI 10.1007/s00779-014-0813-0

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Smart homes and their users: a systematic analysis

and key challenges
Charlie Wilson • Tom Hargreaves •

Richard Hauxwell-Baldwin

Received: 14 December 2013 / Accepted: 1 August 2014

! Springer-Verlag London 2014

Abstract Published research on smart homes and their 1 Introduction

users is growing exponentially, yet a clear understanding of
who these users are and how they might use smart home Smart technologies are pervasive. Embedding information
technologies is missing from a field being overwhelmingly and communication technologies in consumer appliances
pushed by technology developers. Through a systematic such as phones and TVs and in infrastructures such as cities
analysis of peer-reviewed literature on smart homes and and grids promises enhanced functionality, connectivity and
their users, this paper takes stock of the dominant research manageability. Major technology developers, service pro-
themes and the linkages and disconnects between them. viders and energy utilities are now lining up to extend
Key findings within each of nine themes are analysed, smartness beyond specific devices to the home as a whole
grouped into three: (1) views of the smart home—func- and link these smart homes into the meters, wires and pipes of
tional, instrumental, socio-technical; (2) users and the use the utility networks. The market for smart home appliances
of the smart home—prospective users, interactions and alone is projected to grow from $40 m in 2012 to $26bn in
decisions, using technologies in the home; and (3) chal- 2019 [46, p. 78]. The advent of smart homes may ensure
lenges for realising the smart home—hardware and soft- smart technologies become a commonplace feature of peo-
ware, design, domestication. These themes are integrated ple’s lives, whether they are wanted or not [36, p. 358].
into an organising framework for future research that Scientific and technological research on smart homes is
identifies the presence or absence of cross-cutting rela- burgeoning alongside this wave of applied technology
tionships between different understandings of smart homes development. Behind both the technology developers and
and their users. The usefulness of the organising frame- researchers, advancing applied knowledge in this field is a
work is illustrated in relation to two major concerns— clear sense of purpose. Smart homes, it is argued, will
privacy and control—that have been narrowly interpreted ‘‘undoubtedly make our lives much more comfortable than
to date, precluding deeper insights and potential solutions. ever’’ [51, p. 110]. But will they?
Future research on smart homes and their users can benefit A smaller, but growing, number of social science
by exploring and developing cross-cutting relationships researchers are asking: Who are the users of smart homes,
between the research themes identified. and why do they want or need them? Will the technological
promise of ‘‘customized, automated support that is so
Keywords Smart homes ! Users ! Technologies ! gracefully integrated with our lives that it ‘disappears’’’
Households ! Energy ! Assisted living [20, p. 1579] be fulfilled? Might there be unexpected or
perverse consequences? Are smart homes an inevitability
or a choice?
The essence of a smart home is information and com-
munication technologies (ICTs) distributed throughout
C. Wilson (&) ! T. Hargreaves ! R. Hauxwell-Baldwin
rooms, devices and systems (lighting, heating, ventilation)
School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia,
Norwich NR4 7TJ, UK relaying information to users and feeding back user or
e-mail: [email protected] automated commands to manage the domestic environment

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 Pers Ubiquit Comput

[31]. Irrespective of the particular technological configu- to smart home adoption found users lacked a clear sense of
ration of a smart home, its purpose—according to tech- smart home benefits [8]. Meanwhile, large-scale national
nology developers—is ‘‘to improve the living experience’’ smart meter rollouts are underway [19] and off-the-shelf
in some way [35, 54]. This may be through new func- smart home technologies are becoming more widely
tionality such as remote control and automation of appli- available around the world [46]. It is important, therefore,
ances, through enhancement of existing functionality such to synthesise smart homes and user research so far, and set
as heating management, through improved security or out markers for ongoing and future research.
through the provision of assisted living services by moni-
toring, alerting and detecting health incidents [56]. Smart
homes are also the end-use node of the smart energy sys-
tem that allows utilities to respond to real-time flows of 2 Method: systematic literature review
information on energy demand fed back by smart meters
from millions of homes [23]. We conducted a systematic search of the peer-reviewed
Despite this broad range of potential and assumed ben- literature using key words denoting ‘‘user’’ as well as
efits, a clear user-centric vision of smart homes is currently ‘‘smart home’’. Specifically, in July 2012, we searched the
missing from a field being overwhelmingly ‘‘pushed’’ by Scopus database using the search string ‘‘Smart’’ AND
technology developers [65, 70]. This is a critical oversight ‘‘Home’’ AND ‘‘User’’ AND ‘‘Technology’’ and included a
given that the overall success of smart homes, whatever total of 23 synonyms and variants (e.g. ‘‘Residen*’’ and
eventual form they may take, hinges fundamentally on ‘‘Hous*’’ in lieu of ‘‘Home’’, with the *capturing different
their adoption and use by real people in the context of their possible word endings, e.g. ‘‘House’’, ‘‘Housing’’). For
normal everyday lives. This article takes stock of what is further details on the search protocol, see [39].
understood to date about smart homes and their users. This initial search yielded 12,310 articles. In two initial
We conducted a systematic literature review and the- sifts, we reduced the sample to 538 articles by reviewing
matic analysis of 150 peer-reviewed academic publications titles, and then titles and abstracts, and excluding all spu-
that explicitly address ‘‘smart homes’’ and ‘‘users’’ rious or otherwise irrelevant hits. We then used a final sift
(Sect. 2). We identified nine inter-related lines of enquiry to exclude articles which mentioned or referenced users but
and the key findings within each. We organised these on closer examination did not focus on users either directly
themes in three groups: view and visions for the smart or indirectly in the research and analysis. The final sample
home (Sect. 3); understandings of users and the use of was 150 articles that either explicitly investigated pro-
smart homes (Sect. 4); and challenges to the realisation of spective users of smart homes or implicitly considered
smart homes (Sect. 5). We use this analysis to develop an users through inferences on the usability, design or
organising framework for further research on smart home attractiveness of smart home technologies. Using the
users designed to bring coherence and comprehensiveness Scopus disciplinary classifications, this set of 150 articles
to an important and growing field (Sect. 6). We illustrate was dominated by engineering and technical sciences
how the organising framework helps to identify cross- (61 %) with the remainder split evenly between health-
cutting linkages as well as disconnects by applying it to related disciplines (19 %) and the social sciences (20 %)
explore two key issues—privacy and control. We conclude (see Fig. 1 for details).
by calling for future research to build on the organising From our review of this set of 150 articles, we identified
framework to develop more comprehensive understandings an initial set of themes which were iteratively revised,
of the relationships between smart homes and their users expanded and organised hierarchically, noting the key
(Sect. 7). In so doing, we contend that the central user- findings and references within each theme. For further
related challenge for smart home development is not as details of the thematic coding method, see [39]. An anno-
simple as improving their reliability and functionality, or tated bibliography of over 70 articles is freely available for
designing out concerns around trust, privacy or user- download at http://www.refitsmarthomes.org/?attachment_
friendliness. Rather, the challenge is to recognise these id=725.
issues as parts of a broader effort to redefine the notion of The final set of nine themes, organised in three sets of
‘‘smart’’ itself, seeing it as emerging within users’ everyday three, are as follows:
lives and in the ways technologies are used in the home,
1. Views of the smart home
not as something that resides in technologies themselves.
This contribution is timely as the number of research
publications on smart home users is growing exponentially i. functional
(Fig. 1), but has largely followed rather than led a strongly ii. instrumental
technology push field [36]. A recent review of the barriers iii. socio-technical

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Pers Ubiquit Comput

200
Social
180 Sciences (inc.
In depth consideration of users Economics,
160 (accepted in final sift, n=150) Psychology &
Energy)
140 Cursory mention only of users 20%
number of articles

(rejected in final sift, n=388)

120

100

80

60 Medicine,
Computer
Health,
40 Science,
Nursing &
Engineering &
Biology
20 Mathematics
19%
61%
0
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012 (July)
Fig. 1 Peer-reviewed research on smart home users. Notes: Left details). Right panel shows broad non-exclusive disciplinary group-
panel shows exponential growth in published articles using search ings for n = 150 publications reviewed
terms ‘‘smart homes’’ and ‘‘users’’ (and variants thereof—see text for

2. Users and the use of the smart home 3 Why the smart home?

Why is the smart home a growing and potentially important

i. prospective users
field of research and development? Three broad views are
ii. interactions and decisions
evident in the literature: a functional view; an instrumental
iii. technology in the home
view; and a socio-technical view. The functional view sees
3. Challenges for realising the smart home smart homes as a way of better managing the demands of
daily living through technology. The instrumental view
emphasises smart homes’ potential for managing and
i. hardware and software
reducing energy demand in households as part of a wider
ii. design
transition to a low-carbon future. The socio-technical view
iii. domestication
sees the smart home as the next wave of development in the
The first set of themes describes three views of the ongoing electrification and digitalisation of everyday life.
smart home. These views provide the context and
underlying rationale for industry activity and scientific 3.1 The functional view
research, offering different and at times competing
visions or interpretations of what smart homes are and Proponents of the functional view contend that extending
what they are for. The second set of themes relate and integrating the functionality already provided in homes
specifically to the users and use of smart homes. They by a range of information and communication technologies
begin with basic questions about who smart home users (ICTs) will contribute to ‘‘better living’’ (e.g. [32, 59]).
are and what specific characteristics they have. They Much of the technologically oriented literature on smart
then extend to different views of the form, frequency homes presents their benefits for end-users as both obvious
and function of user interactions with smart technolo- and manifold: comfort, security, scheduling tasks, conve-
gies in the home. The final set of themes turns to the nience through automation, energy management and effi-
principal challenges for realising the smart home in the ciency; and for specific end-users, health and assisted
near-term future, distinguishing hardware and software living [20, 63]. Balta-Ozkan et al. [8] group these benefits
development issues from design and usability chal- in three categories: lifestyle support, energy management
lenges. More fundamental questions are also asked and safety.
about the users of smart technologies amidst the com- User-centric research clearly emphasises the enhance-
plex and irregular rhythms and patterns of everyday life ment of existing services not the provision of new ones:
in the home. ‘‘the point of technology is not to replace experiences that

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we already enjoy today with our families… [but to] support transformation of passive end-users into ‘‘micro-resource
or enhance experiences you already enjoy… but in new managers’’ [71, p. 227; see also 33]. Personalised, tailored
ways’’ [40, p. 258]. As examples, smart homes can deliver and real-time information and feedback on energy use (and
better-connected workspaces [15], enhance existing tele- tariffs) via smart meters and in-home displays help to
visions through interactivity [11] and even help overcome ‘‘make energy visible’’ [37, 76]. Smart technologies also
digital divides by including elderly and other households open up a suite of options for household energy manage-
currently marginalised from the information society [54]. ment that were not possible under previous ‘‘dumb’’ sys-
The functional view points to a wide variety of tasks and tems of monthly feedback via energy bills. Smart homes,
activities that smart homes could help people achieve: this view suggests, will enable energy to be cut, trimmed,
remotely controlling specific appliances, improving mem- switched, upgraded or shifted [62].
ory and recall through automated reminders, enhancing However, demonstrated energy savings from the use of
security through simulated occupancy when homes are smart home technologies in studies or field trials are rela-
empty, and so on [14, 56, 59]. These correspond in broad tively small, although potential savings (or ‘‘shaving’’)
terms with users’ perceived needs for improved comfort, during peak times can be more pronounced [22, 26, 78].
convenience, security and entertainment [3]. Improved Large-scale trials of smart meters and in-home displays in
security, in particular, is of clear value to users [49]. the UK demonstrated around 3 % energy reductions on
The most clearly resolved functional view of ‘‘better average [1]. Households’ appetite or capacity for reducing
living’’ is articulated by researchers in the health and social energy bills in response to information feedback and price
care domain. Here, smart homes can ‘‘contribute to the incentives appears limited, and interest in information and
support of the elderly, people with chronic illness and price signals rapidly wears off [38, 74].
disabled people living alone at home… (by improving the Energy utilities are key proponents of the instrumental
quality and variety of information transmitted to the cli- view but are interested less in household-level energy
nician’’ [16, p. 93]). This decision support functionality is savings and more on the rollout of smart meters. These will
centred on monitoring through wearable, implantable and provide utilities with real-time information on both supply
sensing devices to facilitate preventative care and detect and demand distributed across the millions of nodes of the
adverse health incidents [17]. Other health researchers distribution network [58]. Linked in-home displays com-
examine specific vulnerabilities, such as individuals living municating usage and cost information to end-users enable
with serious mental illness, emphasising that caregivers utilities to charge for electricity at its marginal cost, pro-
rather than individuals are often the direct beneficiaries viding a price signal to shift or curtail demand when supply
[34]. is expensive or in short supply [4, 42]. Individual homes
are thus integrated into wider ‘‘smart grids’’, with consid-
3.2 The instrumental view erably improved energy management functionality for
utilities, and potential efficiency gains with associated
A more clearly instrumental or goal-oriented view of smart financial and environmental benefits [57]. This utility-dri-
homes emphasises their potential to help achieve energy ven instrumental view is already strong in the USA (e.g.
demand reduction goals, with associated benefits for [26, 30]) and is increasingly receiving attention in Europe
households, utilities and policymakers. The aims of as the rationale behind smart meter rollouts and smart grid
households trying to save money and energy align with the development (e.g. [19, 23].
efforts of utilities improving energy system management
and the objectives of policymakers pursuing greenhouse 3.3 The socio-technical view
gas emission reduction and a secure and reliable energy
supply. The instrumental view thus sees the smart home as The functional and instrumental views dominated the lit-
an important technological solution in delivering an erature reviewed, but a third ‘‘socio-technical’’ perspective
affordable low-carbon energy transition (e.g. [50, 53] or on smart homes is also evident. Rather than focussing on
sustainability more generally [18]. This builds on existing the specific functions smart homes can offer or seeing
research in the commercial and institutional sectors on smart homes as useful tools to realise broader energy
‘‘intelligent’’ buildings with automated energy manage- objectives, the socio-technical view sees smart homes as
ment systems [13, 77]. simply the latest (or perhaps the next) episode in the coe-
In the instrumental view, core components of the smart volving relationship between technology and society. The
home are smart meters, smart energy-using appliances and socio-technical view emphasises how the use and meaning
energy management functionality to enable user-control of technologies will be socially constructed and iteratively
and programmed optimisation of appliance use and micro- negotiated, rather than being the inevitable outcome of
generation [57]. Energy smart homes thus encourage a assumed functional benefits [5].

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Røpke and colleagues contextualise ‘‘the pervasive decisions about smart home technologies; and (3) how
integration of ICT into everyday practices’’ [66, p. 1771] as broader conceptualisations of the home as the adoption
part of what they call the ‘‘third round of household elec- environment for smart home technologies conditions both
trification’’. Building on Schwartz-Cowan’s [68] seminal users and use.
work on the ‘‘industrialisation of the home’’, they see the
electrification and digitalisation of the home as the latest 4.1 Prospective users of smart homes
round of socio-technical change. Previous rounds involved
lighting (early 1890s) and power and heating (1940s– There are few specific and differentiating characteristics of
1970s). The core technology of the current round is the prospective smart home users identified in the literature.
micro-chip, which has enabled the creeping digitalisation The major exception is in smart homes for assisted living
of almost all aspects of everyday life. which emphasise active ageing and independence, self-
Technology developers’ visions nourish this socio- determination and freedom of choice, and changing and
technical interpretation. Park et al. [59], for example, inter-dependent needs of an ageing population [32, 54].
sketch out working prototypes for smart pens, pillows, Specific needs of elderly smart home users include easily
dressing tables, doormats, picture frames, sofas, walls, accessible contact with emergency help, assistance with
windows and so on, with a correspondingly broad array of hearing or visual impairments and automatic systems to
services, from remembering, reminding, smelling, lighting, detect and prevent falls [10, 14, 43]. Vulnerable users in
recognising, sounding, connecting and reinvigorating. assisted living smart homes comprise more than just the
Taylor et al. [73] emphasise the potential for almost all elderly. Chan et al. [17], for example, highlight the
‘‘surfaces’’ (doors, walls, bowls) to become ‘‘smart’’ digital potential for smart homes to incorporate wearable and
displays in an ‘‘ecology of surfaces’’ with and through implantable devices that can monitor various physiological
which users interact. Even in the health domain with its parameters of patients. Giger et al. [34] focus on those with
more overt surveillance and monitoring function over serious mental illness. Orpwood et al. [56] highlight the
vulnerable household members, smart technology is to be specific user-interface requirements of dementia sufferers.
‘‘embedded seamlessly in the everyday objects of our Beyond these specific characteristics of health-related
lives’’ [45, p. 539]. users, the identities of prospective smart home users have
The socio-technical view of smart homes is distinctive to be inferred. According to the instrumental view, users
in arguing that such technological developments always, are information and price-responsive, and broadly rational
and necessarily, co-evolve with broader and longer-term in seeking to manage domestic energy use (e.g. [23, 50]).
societal changes that may include indirect and unintended In the functional view, technophile users are attracted to an
consequences. Smart homes are important and interesting ICT-enhanced lifestyle, and the potential for control and
precisely because of these potentially transformative but as automation offered by the smart home (e.g. [20, 59]). A
yet unknown effects. Social practices within everyday life small number of articles imply another type of user: the
at home may be combined or scheduled in new ways [55]. incremental home improver. The development of modular,
Differentiated identities, and particularly gender roles, affordable and accessible smart home technologies enables
associated with key household practices such as housework their incorporation into existing as well as new-build
and leisure may be reinforced or destabilised [9, 64]. Smart homes. Potential users may therefore include low- and
home technologies may also change how householders’ middle-income households, as well as high-income tech-
understand, experience and construct meaning around their nophiles (e.g. [53]). A final type of prospective user, pre-
homes and domestic life more generally [6, 25]. valent in the more socio-technical studies reviewed,
identifies women, children and families rather than unitary
households or individual users [25]. Richardson [64] and
4 Who uses smart homes and how? Berg [9], for example, emphasise that women and children
will be smart home users as well as men and therefore that
Analysis of reports, studies, websites and promotional distinct gender roles and identities should be recognised
material produced by smart home technology developers during technological design and development.
and service providers reveals a notable absence of user- These types of prospective smart home user—elderly or
focused research [39]. User-oriented studies in actual smart vulnerable householders, rational energy users, techno-
home environments are notable exceptions rather than the philes, home improvers and differentiated families—are
rule (e.g. [57]). The resulting implicit (rather than explicit) not exclusive. With the exception of health-related users,
understanding and representation of smart home users they are also inferred or assumed rather than explicitly
distinguishes: (1) who prospective users of smart homes identified in smart home user research. Arguably, this lack
might be; (2) how these users might interact with and make of focus on who the actual users of smart homes will be or

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on what they might want has contributed to the limited character. Friedewald et al. [32], for example, recognise
diffusion of smart homes to date: ‘‘If the history of research users as being ‘‘emotional’’ and having moods, as holding
into this area attests to anything, it is the narrowness of the cherished ideals and as valuing communication and inter-
appeal of smart homes to a wider population’’ [73, p. 383]. actions with people. Such characteristics orient decisions
about the use of smart home technologies very differently
4.2 User decisions and interactions with smart home from preferences for minimising energy costs. The
technologies domestic environment is also characterised by ‘‘co-pre-
sence’’, meaning one individual’s goals and preferences
Users must interact or interface with smart home technol- may not be shared by others and so must be pragmatically
ogies in some way, but these interactions can be more or negotiated (see also [36–38]).
less frequent and more or less passive or active (e.g. [41]).
In a recent, influential depiction of the smart home, Cook 4.3 Characterising the ‘‘home’’ in smart homes
reduces user interactions with smart home systems to one-
off goal-setting: ‘‘computer software playing the role of an Within much of the technologically focussed literature on
intelligent agent perceives the state of the physical envi- smart homes, the domestic environment is simply the
ronment and residents using sensors, reasons about this ‘‘taken for granted’’ backdrop within which technology will
state using artificial intelligence techniques and then takes be used [64]. In their content analysis of smart home
actions to achieve specified goals, such as maximizing marketing materials, Hargreaves et al. [39] found that most
comfort of the residents’’ [20, p. 1579]. Users are inter- images of smart homes depicted them as sterile, bland and
preted as having fixed and stable needs and preferences that neutral spaces that appeared unlived in. Such depictions are
homes, rather than the users themselves, can manage unsurprising given that much of the technological research
optimally. Smart homes as intelligent and context-aware and testing of smart home equipment occurs in artificially
learning systems remove the need for any active user constructed test homes (e.g. [17]). These are little more
involvement at all by automating functions according to than ‘‘a set of walls and enclosed spaces’’ [73, p. 383 our
users’ revealed habits (e.g. [24, 52, 67]). emphasis]. Increasingly, however, this view is giving way
These visions of intelligent homes are countered by the to a more complex understanding of homes which sees
complexity, potential inflexibility and poor manageability them as internally differentiated, emotionally loaded,
of fully automated smart homes that are cited as key bar- shared and contested places.
riers to their adoption [8, 12]. A long-standing irony in Ethnographic and sociological research on the use of
human–computer interactions is that ‘‘the more advanced a ICTs in domestic contexts finds homes are actively divided
control system, the more crucial may be the contribution of by their occupants into functionally and interpretively
the human operator’’ [7, p. 775]. End-users rank automa- distinct spaces. Communication technologies tend to be
tion as a desirable feature of smart homes, but this is used and stored in different places within the home for
qualified by calls for such automation to be strictly limited quite different purposes [21]. These places may be ‘‘eco-
to chains of functions that users could programme or set-up logical habitats’’ (where communication media is kept),
themselves: ‘‘computers should not make choices for users, ‘‘activity centres’’ (where media is produced, consumed
but the other way around’’ [49, p. 240]. Indeed, alongside and transformed) and ‘‘coordinate displays’’ (where media
automation, another important role of the smart home in are displayed and made available to others in order to
most current visions is to provide useful information to coordinate activities). All these places play significant roles
users about various aspects of household functioning (e.g. in the flow and communication of information within
room temperatures or occupancy, appliance conditions, homes. The spatial layout of specific technologies also
energy usage) in an effort to help them make more actively divides up homes, with certain activities being
informed choices and decisions. undertaken in particular places (e.g. [6, 40, 75]). Tech-
User interactions with smart homes might therefore nologies and objects as ‘‘clutter’’ can help people give
range from a one-off input of preferences for the domestic meaning and order to domestic space as part of the per-
environment (‘‘set and forget’’) to ongoing, repeated and petual project of organising and constructing the home
adaptive decision-making and control. This latter possi- [72]. This internal differentiation of the home matters for
bility leads to a small strand of research focussed on how how, where, how often and by whom smart home tech-
users make decisions about smart home technologies. The nologies are likely to be used.
instrumental view assumes users respond rationally to Domestic environments can also be emotionally
improved feedback, information and price signals (e.g. charged. Haines et al. [36] identified the importance of
[78]). Alternative framings of domestic decision-making memories and relationships in a study of what end-users
have emphasised its emotional, negotiated and pragmatic might value in smart homes. Baillie and Benyon [6, p. 227]

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similarly argue that ‘‘homes are places loaded with emo- The salience of these technological challenges varies
tion, meaning and memories’’. Domestic technologies will widely depending on the technologists’ underlying vision
not serve solely functional purposes, but will be used and for the smart home.
understood within broader and pre-existing household For Friedewald et al. [32], reliability is the central
‘‘moral economies’’—the unique and normally unques- challenge as this attribute will underpin user-friendliness
tioned sets of values, routines and practices that underpin and empowerment. Smart homes must neither fail nor do
domestic life [38, 69, 76]. unpredictable things. Edwards and Grinter [29] highlight
Moreover, although households may be a convenient several different aspects of the reliability challenge,
unit of analysis, families are plural (e.g. [25]). Homes must including: debugging smart homes created ‘‘accidentally’’
be understood as shared and contested places in which by technologies introduced piecemeal; administering and
different household members may have different under- fixing smart homes through self-healing systems that
standings, preferences, rights, responsibilities and emo- remove the need for household or third party system
tional associations. Richardson [64], for example, focuses administrators; and inferring occupancy activity from
attention on the gendered nature of technology use (see sensor data that may be both ambiguous and unreliable.
also [9]). She illustrates how technologies are often Reliability is most important in smart homes for assisted
designed in ways that fail to respond sufficiently to how living in which failures to sense or make inaccurate
women as opposed to men and children use domestic inferences about the nature of occupant behaviour could
spaces. Baillie and Benyon [6] further distinguish between have life-threatening consequences. As Orpwood et al. [56,
more active users—who set and enforce the rules for p. 162] note with regards to dementia sufferers: ‘‘judge-
technology use at home—and more passive users who ments made [on human behaviour] are always going to be
comply with (and at times resist) these rules. probabilistic, and the designer has to incorporate means of
dealing with errors, particularly in safety critical
situations’’.
5 What are the user-related challenges for realising A recurring theme in discussions around reliability,
smart homes? debugging and interoperability of smart home technologies
is the importance of ‘‘future proofing’’ to ensure compati-
The smart home is yet to be realised at scale, despite the bility both between successive generations of smart home
various views and propositions of the benefits it can pro- technologies as well as between interacting components.
vide to households. The technical literature that dominates Modularity, flexibility and retrospective compatibility are
smart home and user research (see Fig. 1) identifies the key frequently cited as necessary technological attributes (e.g.
technological and design challenges to be overcome. Spe- [61]). Future proofing also insulates smart home technolo-
cific issues within these two sets of challenges are in line gies from changes in regulatory frameworks, standards and
with the social barriers to the adoption of smart homes policy objectives, particularly in the energy domain [53].
identified in public deliberative workshops by Balta-Ozkan
et al. [8]: loss of control, reliability, privacy, trust, cost and 5.2 Designing technologies for smart home users
irrelevance. However, there is a third set of challenges that
more explicitly situates users in the adoption environment The acceptability of smart homes to users is closely linked
of the home and examines how and whether smart home to issues of security, privacy and trust as well as practical
technologies may be effectively domesticated. and ergonomic concerns with user-friendliness. These
issues present critical design challenges that relate to the
5.1 Developing technologies for smart home users interactions between users and smart home technologies.
With respect to security, for example, Cook observes
Numerous research, development, testing and trialling that ‘‘many individuals are reluctant to introduce sensing
challenges need to be overcome before the widespread technologies into their home, wary of leaving digital trails
commercialisation of smart homes becomes a realistic that others can monitor and use to their advantage, such as
prospect. Key technical issues include: (1) monitors and to break in when the house is empty’’ [20, p. 1578]. In
sensors that can reliably detect and sense what is going in smart homes for assisted living, Demiris et al. [27] simi-
the home, and algorithms that can accurately infer activi- larly note user concerns with privacy arguing that tech-
ties and patterns from the resulting abundance of data; (2) nologies that detect and monitor activity within the home
interoperability and retrospective compatibility of smart risk being seen as intrusive violations in the domestic
home technologies, supported by well-designed and flexi- environment. For energy smart homes, concerns around
ble standards; and (3) functional reliability and manage- both data security and the potential for utilities to monitor
ability [20]. or even control household demand have led to consumer

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backlashes against smart metering [2, 23]. In the UK, a technologies with the messy and differentiated nature of
recent study on attitudes and values towards energy system users’ everyday lives at home [41].
change found general support for the development of smart New technologies are rarely used in homes in the ways
homes, but with caveats around data sharing and a per- their designers intend because they must always enter pre-
ceived loss of control through remote interference from existing environments that are contested, emotionally
utilities [60]. Paetz et al. [57] report similar findings from charged and dynamic (e.g. [40]). These apparently chaotic
Germany. domestic environments possess their own ‘‘smartness’’ or
How smart homes are designed will condition their ‘‘intelligence’’ in the way, for example, that households
acceptability to prospective users. Cook [20] advocates for manage communications [21], make use of surfaces such as
clearly defining and guaranteeing levels of privacy and the tables or fridges [73] or organise the flow of clutter and
safety and security of technologies. Paetz et al. [57] suggest mess through the home [72]. Smart home technology
the need for much greater levels of transparency and development to date has assumed everyday life is made up
accountability on behalf of smart home developers—par- of specific, repetitive and relatively predictable routines
ticularly energy utilities—and the need to make explicit and schedules. But on closer examination, life at home is
exactly how all stakeholders may benefit from smart home ‘‘organic, opportunistic and improvisational’’ [25, p. 19].
development. Rohracher [65] argues that many of these This generates new sets of design principles for gener-
issues might be avoided if more participatory approaches to ating technologies that align with and support users in
design were employed. He suggests engaging with a wide managing everyday life. Technologies can be built ‘‘for
range of different stakeholders even at the visioning stage for ambiguity, instability, concealment, and disinterest, and to
smart home technologies, to ensure that the widest possible be treated casually’’ [72, p. 21]. Davidoff et al. [25] offer a
range of interests and concerns are recognised and addressed. set of seven principles that suggest new technologies
Several other studies highlight more narrowly framed should account for ‘‘the organic evolution of routines and
design challenges regarding the user-friendliness of smart plans’’, ‘‘periodic changes, exceptions and improvisation’’,
homes. Park et al. [59, p. 189], for example, outline the ‘‘breakdowns’’, ‘‘multiple, overlapping and occasionally
immense variety of potential smart applications but caution conflicting goals’’ and that should ‘‘participate in the con-
against ‘‘overpowering’’ users with ‘‘complex technolo- struction of family identity’’ [25, p. 28].
gies’’. Several studies have highlighted the difficulties of Unless the smart home concept is re-thought in these
creating intuitive and easy-to-use user-interfaces given the ways, it is unlikely to succeed. Yet as Howard and col-
level of complexity and number of user-control options that leagues caution, such principles would be ‘‘fiendishly diffi-
can potentially lie behind the interface (e.g. [28, 49, 59]). cult to apply to technology research’’ [44, p. 329]. The
User-centred design is widely cited as a useful response central user-related challenge for the realisation of smart
to smart home design challenges. Orpwood et al. [56] homes is therefore not to improve the reliability or func-
identify a number of simple design solutions that could tionality of technologies, nor to design out concerns around
help overcome specific difficulties faced by dementia suf- trust, privacy or user-friendliness, but to re-define the notion
ferers, including wariness of new devices and forgetful- of ‘‘smart’’ itself, recognising that it emerges within users’
ness. By working with carers, researchers could identify everyday lives and in the ways technologies are used in the
simple and often low-tech solutions such as making devi- home. As Taylor and colleagues explain: ‘‘it is people who
ces look familiar, concealing them from view so as to avoid imbue their homes with intelligence by continually weaving
causing alarm and providing prompts and reminders rather together things in their physical worlds with their everyday
than taking control away from users. Different groups of routines and distinct social arrangements’’ [73, p. 383].
users are likely to require different design solutions, not
only just between households but also between cultures.
Jeong et al. [47], for example, reveal stark differences in 6 Discussion
the understanding of and demand for control between USA
and Korean smart home users. Our thematic analysis of the literature on smart homes and
their users was organised under three meta-themes: (1)
5.3 Situating smart home technologies amid everyday visions or ‘‘grand narratives’’ for the smart home; (2) users
life at home and their uses of smart homes; and (3) user-related chal-
lenges to realising smart homes. Within each of these meta-
‘‘More than control of their devices, families desire more themes, we distinguished three distinct lines of enquiry
control over their lives’’ [25, p. 20 emphasis in original]. pursued by peer-reviewed research. These are summarised in
Accordingly, the central user-related challenge for the Table 1. Each line of enquiry provides its own answers to the
realisation of smart homes is to align and adapt key research questions about smart homes and their users.

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Table 1 Core themes in smart home user research, and how they answer key research questions
Views of the smart home Functional Instrumental Socio-technical

What is the smart home? A monitored, sensed environment that An optimally managed building energy system A digital, technological, networked vision confronted by the
informs occupants allowing active allowing information and price-responsive mundane realities of domestic life
control or automation adjustments to behaviour
What is the purpose of the Improve quality of home life through new Enable energy demand reduction in the home and No inherent purpose, functions emerge through incorporation
smart home? services and enhanced functionality improved system management by utilities into practices within the wider trajectory of ICT penetration
into the home
Users and use of the smart home Prospective users Interactions with technology Homes as complex places

Who uses smart homes? Users with specific health needs or users Users seeking control over the domestic Differentiated households with negotiated
who are price or information responsive environment and energy usage through roles within the distinct spaces of the
in both existing and new-build homes flexible or schedulable behaviours home
How is technology used? Varies according to application with From continuous and active user- A gradual and adaptive process of
assisted living smart homes mediated control to passive one-off ‘‘set domestication into the existing
emphasising passive usage and energy and forget’’ dynamics of routines and practices
smart homes active usage

Challenges for realising the smart home Hardware and software Design and usability Situating technologies in homes

How can smart homes be realised? Develop and improve technologies to Design for user needs (not vice versa) and Ensure technologies are adaptable to
ensure robustness and reliability as basis address privacy concerns through clear everyday domestic contexts and allow
for social acceptability and transparent rights and roles, and flexibility for domestication and
participatory co-design appropriation
What research approaches are useful? Computer science, electrical engineering, User-centred design, human–computer Sociology, ethnography, science and
design interaction, behavioural and social technology studies, innovation studies
psychology

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Although Table 1 sets out different groupings of such as comfort and convenience will confound the energy
research themes, there is clearly much overlap. Figure 2 management goals of the instrumental view amid the
shows the main inter-relationships between the nine themes broader potential for smart homes to generate more
identified. The strong links in Fig. 2 between ‘‘functional’’, resource-intensive trajectories of socio-technical change
‘‘user-technology interactions’’ and ‘‘hardware and soft- [48]. Introducing new technologies changes service
ware’’ typify the engineering and technical scientific expectations and use patterns, which in turn change sub-
approach. Similarly, the strong links between ‘‘socio- sequent demands, wants and needs for new technologies
technical’’, ‘‘home as complex places’’ and ‘‘domesticating and the resources they consume, normalising ever more
technologies’’ characterise a critical social scientific intensive ways of living [40, 55].
approach. The solid vertical lines in Fig. 2, therefore, These disconnects between research positioned within
represent the concerns of different research traditions and the functional and instrumental views, and research con-
disciplines shown in the final row of Table 1, and of the tributing to the socio-technical view are clearly shown in
competing visions for smart homes. Fig. 2. Efforts to develop stronger horizontal linkages
The functional view gives rise to a series of techno- provide a clear avenue for future research.
logical challenges around how enhanced functionality can This is best illustrated by example. Two salient issues in
be efficiently and reliably delivered. This includes a smart home user research concern privacy and control.
detailed consideration of interactions between users and Table 1 and Fig. 2 show how both issues could be
technology around issues such as control and automation. approached from alternative and potentially complemen-
The instrumental view gives rise to a set of design chal- tary angles that help expose and clarify key issues more
lenges around how users can be made to accept and align clearly and generate wider insights.
with the energy reduction goals of the smart home based on Privacy, access to data, and issues of trust, reliability
rational responses to information and price signals. The and transparency are a major concern for prospective
socio-technical view gives rise to a more foundational and users of smart homes [27]. In the literature reviewed,
broadly cast set of challenges relating to the balance these issues are considered primarily to be design chal-
between users and technologies in smart homes, recognis- lenges affecting hardware and software developments that
ing the complex and contested nature of homes as places shape how users interact with technologies (e.g. [20, 57]).
for technology adoption and use. The socio-technical view of smart homes, however, sets
Coherence and consistency between the lines of enquiry issues of privacy within broader considerations of how the
identified in the vertical relationships of Fig. 2 have come pervasive influence of ICT-enabled networks and net-
largely at the expense of strong cross-cutting horizontal working are blurring the lines between the private and the
linkages between research themes. Yet as and when smart social, the domestic and the public. The instrumental
homes diffuse more widely into the fabric of everyday life benefits to utilities of real-time information on energy
at home, the functional, instrumental and socio-technical demand and micro-generation rely on a recalculation of
views will increasingly interact and combine, presenting how much privacy (on electricity and gas usage) should
more (and potentially more intractable) challenges. be exchanged for how much potential for optimising
The technological optimism and clarity of the func- home energy systems [33]. For users to become active
tional view will confront the just-the-next-thing normality ‘‘micro-resource managers’’ [71], privacy is further forfeit
of the socio-technical view with all its ambiguities and through the market trades and transactions through which
uncertainties. Functional service enhancements in areas preferences are revealed.

Fig. 2 Organising framework

for research on smart homes and
their users. Notes: Thick solid,
solid and thin dashed lines
denote strong, weak explicit and
weak implicit inter-
relationships, respectively, in
smart home user research to
date

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Nor is privacy an issue simply between households (us) technological system of which the domestic environment is
and utilities or smart home installers and maintenance a microscopic part. The holy grail for users may not be
operators (them). Seeing smart homes as complex adoption control over technologies but rather control over the hectic,
environments for new technologies reveals how enhanced chaotic and demanding domestic lives into which smart
functionality for one household member may imply a loss homes must fit [8, 25].
of privacy for another. Privacy may be sought within the Figure 2 thus shows how both control and privacy mean
differentiated spaces of a home that smart home technol- different things in different parts of the smart home liter-
ogies may inadvertently erode through communication, ature. Defining issues or problems narrowly and pursuing
sharing and unitary control. Privacy is even constitutive of singular lines of enquiry precludes wider insights. Future
what a home means: any monitoring of the domestic research on smart homes and their users can benefit
environment challenges how occupants identify with their immensely by explicitly tracing, exploring and seeking to
homes [10]. It is entirely unsurprising, therefore, that strengthen the cross-cutting relationships between research
technologies designed to sense, interpret and control these themes highlighted in our organising framework summa-
uniquely emotional and memory-laden places evoke con- rised in Fig. 2.
cerns over privacy [6, 72].
Alongside privacy, issues of control and automation are
another of the central uncertainties in the body of research 7 Conclusions
concerned with what users might want or need from smart
homes. And as with privacy, there are many contrasting Smart homes are an advancing wave of technological
perspectives on control and automation shown in the development whose success depends on a coalescence
organising framework in Fig. 2. between the visions of technology developers for enhanced
Control can be about households protecting their functionality and energy management, and the needs and
domestic environments from outsiders (security), or control demands of households in the complex places that are
can be about automating various functions and services homes. User-focused research on smart homes is growing,
[49]. Control can also be about autonomy and indepen- dominated by engineering, technical sciences and design,
dence within the home (mobile and always-on maintenance but with a sizeable niche of health care-related research,
and care) or about responding to information from outside and increasing attention from social scientists ranging from
the home (utility price signals). Even the technologists’ ethnographers and domestication theorists to economists
vision in the functional view is unclear on the extent to and applied energy researchers. Yet there is a wide and
which smartness should reside in the technologies— growing recognition of the need to develop a better picture
learning, inferring and pre-empting occupants’ behaviour of who users are and how they might use smart homes (e.g.
(e.g. [20])—or should reside in the users—maintaining [10, 70]). Although two of the themes analysed from the
active control or a watchful over-riding eye on automated literature (on ‘‘user-technology interactions’’ and ‘‘accept-
functions [e.g. 49]. ability and usability’’) are most strongly informed by
These complexities are magnified if questions are asked research on user-centred design, these themes have not
about the nature of the home as the arena in which issues of typically been entry points for thinking about the purpose
control and automation play out. Household members have and use of smart homes. Rather, they have emerged as a
different roles in this arena and in different spaces within consequence of a technological vision that is struggling to
this arena. Control over the interface with smart home gain user acceptance. The result is that current visions of
technologies thereby translates into shifts of control within smart homes have a limited appeal to users and are per-
the different genders and generations in a household (e.g. ceived as failing to meet user needs [57]. This has given
[38]). By failing to recognise that users value time, roles rise to what Nyborg and Røpke [55] term ‘‘funwashing’’ as
and relationships in their domestic lives, rather than nar- smart home developers seek to broaden the appeal of smart
rowly circumscribed technologies and functionalities, there homes because the basic functionality they offer has not
are growing concerns that smart home technology is proven as attractive as initially hoped.
coming to dominate people, rather than the other way A systematic review of published literatures on smart
around [25]. homes and their users reveals a wide range of research
Seeing smart homes as merely a small part of broader themes and lines of enquiry, often characterised by particular
trajectories of socio-technical change dramatically shifts and partial questions (see Table 1). An integrative approach
the framing of control again. Paradoxically, the greater to smart home user research is neither desirable nor practical,
individual control over the domestic environment but a comprehensive framework for positioning and inter-
that smart homes offer is entirely compatible with an relating research is. Our thematic analysis of the literature
individual’s loss of control over the broader social and proposes such an organising framework (see Fig. 2). We

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illustrate how this framework can advance future research on 13. Bull R, Fleming P, Irvine K, Rieser M (2013) Are people the
smart homes and their users in relation to two major con- problem or the solution? A critical look at the rise of the smart/
intelligent building and the role of ICT enabled engagement.
cerns: privacy and control. In so doing, we argue that it ECEEE Summer Study (European Council for an Energy Effi-
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terrain of research on smart homes and to help map out new 14. Cesta A, Cortellessa G, Rasconi R, Pecora F, Scopelliti M,
and more fruitful avenues for future research. Tiberio L (2011) Monitoring elderly people with the robocare
domestic environment: interaction synthesis and user evaluation.
Comput Intell 27(1):60–82
Acknowledgments Andrew May provided comments on an earlier 15. Chae HH, Kim MJ (2011) Approaches to smart home with a
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