The Cadaver in the Machine: The Social Practices of Measurement and
  Validation in Motion Capture Technology
Emma Harvey Hauke Sandhaus Abigail Z. Jacobs Emanuel Moss Mona Sloane
Motion capture systems, used across various domains, make body
representations concrete through technical processes. We argue that the
measurement of bodies and the validation of measurements for motion capture
systems can be understood as social practices. By analyzing the findings of a
systematic literature review (N=278) through the lens of social practice
theory, we show how these practices, and their varying attention to errors,
become ingrained in motion capture design and innovation over time. Moreover,
we show how contemporary motion capture systems perpetuate assumptions about
human bodies and their movements. We suggest that social practices of
measurement and validation are ubiquitous in the development of data- and
sensor-driven systems more broadly, and provide this work as a basis for
investigating hidden design assumptions and their potential negative
consequences in human-computer interaction.