The “Kaeru-Chan” Webapp is a playful social technology intended to connect people with physical community spaces (specifically akiya, or vacant houses in Japan) through the stewardship of a virtual “frog” token. Participants become temporary stewards of a frog, carrying a location-tagged frog (a digital token, possibly represented by a physical mascot “Kaeru-chan”) from one akiya site to another. This is akin to a “passing the torch” ritual: when a visitor arrives at an akiya, they take charge of the frog and later deliver it to the next location. The overarching goal is to explore how such an interactive location-based game can influence human behavior and feelings toward places and communities. In other words, can a traveling virtual pet frog deepen people’s attachment to these revitalized homes and encourage social connections?
To address this question, we need a robust experiment design grounded in social psychology and HCI research. As a behavioral science researcher, one would approach the frog webapp as an intervention: a social object introduced into a community to observe changes in behavior, attitudes, and social dynamics. This document outlines relevant literature, proposes hypotheses, and suggests experimental designs to study Kaeru-chan’s impact on community engagement and place attachment.
Modern research shows that digital or gamified interventions in physical spaces can significantly shape how people interact with places and with each other. A key concept here is place attachment – the emotional bond between a person and a place. Place attachment is strengthened by meaningful experiences and social ties in a location. In the context of Akiya Collective, we hypothesize that introducing a fun social technology (the frog) can provide those meaningful experiences, thus enhancing visitors’ attachment to the akiya houses.
Location-based games and engagement: A prominent example of technology influencing place attachment is Pokémon GO and other augmented reality games. Studies on Pokémon GO found that such games not only get people moving but also facilitate community belonging and place attachment by encouraging players to explore real-world locations and interact with others. The positive emotions and social interactions from play contributed to players feeling more connected with their environment and community. In fact, research noted that social interactions and enjoyment were stronger predictors of increased place attachment than sheer time spent playing. This implies that a game which sparks face-to-face interaction can make participants feel more “at home” in the places where those interactions occur. Similarly, a study on AR-enhanced public art noted that blending digital experiences with physical space created a strong sense of place attachment and changed how people engaged with urban places. These findings suggest that the frog webapp, essentially a location-based, interactive game, could have a measurable impact on how attached visitors become to the akiya houses by making their visits more engaging and social.
Social objects as catalysts: The frog token can be seen as a “social object.” In social science, a social object is any item or concept that people center their interactions around. By providing a shared focus, it makes interpersonal engagement more comfortable and likely. Museum research by Nina Simon (2010) and others describes how artifacts that visitors can talk about or play with become engines of socially networked experiences. In our case, Kaeru-chan the traveling frog is a social object connecting participants across different houses. It gives strangers a reason to talk (“Oh, you brought the frog here!”), thus lowering barriers to interaction. The frog facilitates a third-point communication: people converse through the object rather than directly, which is known to help strangers bond. Moreover, social objects are transactional: they move between people and carry stories or information, further creating a network of participants. We anticipate that the frog will accumulate anecdotes of its journey, becoming a communal story that unites the Akiya visitors. This is very much by design: the frog’s webapp will show its travel log, prompting social media posts and conversations. From a research standpoint, we can examine how introducing this social object alters the social dynamics at each akiya node (for example, do people linger to chat more, do they visit in pairs or groups more often, etc., once the frog activity is in place?).
Behavioral science theories: Two psychological phenomena are particularly relevant to why the frog experiment might change behavior: the foot-in-the-door effect and the Tamagotchi effect. The foot-in-the-door (FITD) technique is a compliance strategy whereby getting someone to agree to a small request increases the likelihood they’ll agree to a larger request later. By analogy, having visitors perform the small act of ferrying a frog could increase their commitment to the community in the long run. In classic experiments, researchers found that homeowners who agreed to trivial tasks (like answering a short survey) were later far more willing to perform bigger tasks (like allowing a large sign in their yard) The psychology behind this is that people infer their own attitudes from their actions (self-perception) and strive for consistency. Thus, if a person goes out of their way to participate in the frog game (a small altruistic act for the community), they may come to see themselves as the kind of person who supports the Akiya initiative, making them more likely to volunteer for other community projects or revisit the spaces. We intend to test this: does initial participation lead to heightened ongoing involvement (a larger “ask”)?
The Tamagotchi effect refers to the tendency for humans to develop emotional attachment to virtual or physical objects that exhibit life-like qualities. Even though the frog is not a real animal, treating it as a pet project or mascot might trigger caretaking instincts. Just as people became fond of their virtual pets in the Tamagotchi game (feeding and tending them devotedly) our participants might feel responsible for “Kaeru-chan” and, by extension, responsible for the Akiya spaces it visits. This anthropomorphic attachment could make the experience more emotionally resonant. We might see participants giving the frog a personality, or feeling pride in being a good steward (e.g., “I need to bring the frog safely to the next house!”). Such emotional engagement is likely to encourage repeat participation and deeper connection. In summary, theory and prior findings predict that a small fun commitment (moving a frog) can lead to bigger psychological investments (stronger community ties), and that even a “fake frog” can evoke real emotions that influence behavior.
Finally, it’s worth noting cultural and contextual factors. The Japanese word “kaeru” means frog but also “to return”, and frog charms are often seen as symbols of safe return or good luck in travel. While not explicitly a part of the academic framework, this cultural nuance could amplify the sense of meaning: people might perceive the frog’s journey as symbolic of returning life and activity to empty houses. Leveraging such symbolism could be an interesting angle in the experimental design (perhaps measuring if participants resonate with the narrative or not).
Based on the above background, we propose several hypotheses about the frog webapp’s impact. These hypotheses address both behavioral outcomes (what people do) and psychological outcomes (what people feel or perceive). The primary research question is: How does participating in the frog stewardship game influence visitors’ behavior and their connection to the akiya spaces and community? From this, we derive specific hypotheses:
Additionally, we remain open to emergent hypotheses as the project unfolds. For example, perhaps stewardship of the frog increases a sense of responsibility or pro-social behavior in the spaces (people might take better care of the house while they have the frog, akin to looking after a shared resource). Another hypothesis might be H6: The frog as an HCI interface improves information sharing: maybe the webapp’s journey map leads users to also share tips or notes about each location, effectively crowdsourcing a guide for new visitors. We will keep these possibilities in mind and design measurements to capture any unplanned benefits or changes in behavior that the frog facilitates.
Designing an experiment for a community-based intervention requires balancing rigor with realism. We want to contribute valid findings to social psychology, so control and measurement are important, but we also must respect the organic nature of community participation (and make the experience enjoyable, not overly “laboratory-like”). Below, we outline an experimental framework consisting of participant recruitment, conditions (intervention vs control), procedures, and measurement strategies. This framework treats the akiya houses as living lab spaces for social research. Each site can host experiments, and together they form a network of experimental nodes.