Levity

Levity is a speculative sensing system that makes invisible social pressure perceptible.

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Inspiration

Many moments of self-doubt do not begin inside us.

They begin in the environment.

A crowded meeting room.
A fast-moving conversation.
A social gathering where everyone seems effortlessly comfortable.

Afterward we replay every moment in our heads:

Did I say something wrong?
Why couldn’t I speak up?
Maybe I’m just not confident enough.

But what we often fail to perceive is the invisible pressure generated by the environment itself.

Every social environment produces subtle interaction signals — voices, spatial proximity, body language, and emotional tension. Together these signals form a pattern that shapes how people feel and behave.

We call this pattern Social Gravity.

Humans can perceive temperature, sound, and movement.
But we currently have no direct way to perceive Social Gravity.

Levity was created to explore a simple question:

What if people could sense the social forces shaping their interactions?

What it does

Levity introduces a speculative new perceptual layer that allows people to sense Social Gravity.

The system translates subtle environmental and physiological signals into a legible representation of social pressure.

Levity consists of two components:

Levi Ring (conceptual wearable)
A near-future sensing ring that detects subtle changes in physiological tension and environmental interaction signals.

Levity App (interface prototype)
A mobile interface that interprets these signals and visualizes patterns of social pressure.

The system can:

  • Estimate a real-time Social Gravity Score
  • Map behavioral signals into a Self-Doubt Index
  • Provide subtle haptic feedback when environmental pressure intensifies
  • Visualize patterns over time to reveal how environments shape emotional responses

Instead of treating discomfort as personal failure, Levity reframes it as a signal from the environment.

Over time, this awareness can help users develop spatial agency — the ability to understand and navigate social environments with greater clarity.

How we built it

Levity was developed during Figbuild 26, a hackathon exploring speculative technological futures.

Our design process combined speculative technology design with interaction design.

First, we investigated how environmental interaction signals influence emotional responses in social situations.

From this research we defined the concept of Social Gravity, which describes how multiple signals combine to shape perceived pressure.

Key signals include:

  • Conversation intensity
  • Conversation rhythm
  • Proxemic density
  • Body language
  • Ambient stress level

We then imagined a near-future sensing system capable of detecting these patterns.

The Levi Ring was designed as a conceptual wearable capable of sensing physiological tension and environmental acoustic dynamics without recording personal data.

Using Figma make, we developed a conceptual interface prototype that visualizes Social Gravity through real-time feedback, historical dashboards, and environmental pattern analysis.

Finally, we created narrative scenarios to demonstrate how Levity might support users in real social contexts.

Challenges we ran into

Designing a system for sensing social environments introduced several challenges.

One challenge was translating a complex social phenomenon into something legible without oversimplifying human experience.

Another challenge was avoiding deterministic interpretation. Levity does not label environments as positive or negative; instead, it presents signals that users can interpret for themselves.

We also considered the risk of score anxiety, where users might become overly focused on numerical feedback.

To address this, Levity reveals certain insights only when meaningful patterns emerge rather than continuously displaying emotional metrics.

Privacy was another key concern. The speculative system avoids recording conversations or identifying individuals, focusing instead on environmental dynamics.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are proud of creating a speculative system that expands how people might perceive social environments.

The project introduces a new conceptual framework — Social Gravity — that connects environmental signals with emotional experience.

We also designed a coherent product ecosystem including a wearable sensing device, a mobile interface, and narrative user scenarios.

Most importantly, Levity reframes self-doubt as something influenced by context rather than purely personal limitations.

What we learned

This project revealed how deeply environments shape emotional responses.

Many experiences that feel like personal shortcomings are actually responses to environmental dynamics.

We also learned that designing technologies that interpret human behavior requires careful ethical framing.

Speculative design allowed us to explore new possibilities for human perception while questioning how such systems should be responsibly designed.

What's next for Levity

Levity opens the possibility of technologies that expand how humans perceive social environments.

Future explorations could include:

  • developing sensing models for environmental interaction signals
  • exploring spatial visualization of Social Gravity in real environments
  • studying how awareness of environmental pressure influences emotional wellbeing

Levity ultimately asks:

What if we could perceive social forces as clearly as we perceive sound or light?

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