Supporting Couples' Social Well-being in Daily Life: A Needs Assessment and Co-design with Co-located Couples

Abstract: Romantic relationships shape physical, mental, and social well-being, and relationship quality is built through everyday interactions. Addressing minor issues early and reinforcing positive interactions help maintain relationship quality, and ubiquitous computing creates new opportunities to sense and support couples' relationships in daily life. However, existing systems remain largely developed with limited involvement from couples, raising questions about which types of sensing and support couples may accept in their private lives. To address this gap, we conducted exploratory needs-assessment interviews and co-design sessions with five co-located couples (10 participants) to identify their needs and preferences for relationship-attunement-enhancing technologies, including the use of LLMs. Couples' own designs converged on systems that detect meaningful moments---such as conflict onset---and offer subtle mediation rather than AI-generated advice, highlighting dyadic concerns around partners' agency, authenticity, and control over shared interaction data. We offer preliminary design implications for ubiquitous sensing and intervention systems that center the couple as a unit rather than the individual.