100 Minds in Motion

Successful design of the built environment requires us to predict how people will move in and through spaces. Ideally, building inhabitants would move comfortably, stay oriented, find the locations they are seeking, and exit with ease. However, many buildings can leave inhabitants lost, confused, and physically and emotionally stressed. Poor design impacting movement in space can affect care in hospitals, success in transport connections, learning in schools, performance at work and risk of injury in fire and other emergency evacuations.

Collective movement in buildings has been studied for many years and has resulted in software that can help predict where people will move. However, the data used in the models fails to distinguish the different mobility patterns of individuals and subgroups in the population. No account is taken for age, mobility levels or neurodiversity. Basic research is needed, and it may be useful to create a 1:1 mock-up of actual designs to determine specific risks or weaknesses. Such mock-ups of building layouts ideally would have the capacity for detailed tracking of individual movement and gait within them, yet to our knowledge, there is no current system available to track individual behaviour at this level of granularity in the UK or beyond.

100 Minds in Motion utilises a flexible architecture of moveable partitions, a new camera tracking system, a location-based sensor system, as well as different wearable biosensors and to reveal the movement patterns of 100+ participants in a light/sound/temperature-controlled physical space at UCL PEARL. Combining the physical setup and motion tracking technologies with measures such as heart rate, EEG, eye tracking, or cortisol measures allows for rigorous assessment of what features of a given design can lead to different experience or, for example, levels of stress in different groups of individuals (e.g. neurodivergent individuals, wheelchair users, or those with dementia). By further asking participants for their demographics, the team will also examine how the movement patterns of subgroups in the population may differ, helping provide precise insight into human movement in the built environment.

Related Event

100 Minds in Motion Panel Discussion | Thursday 22 May

A panel discussion with the project leads and academic and industry experts exploring how the built environment and individual differences shape crowd behaviour and emotions. Watch the recording below or on Vimeo.