Exploring everyday kindness: A framework of motives, facilitators, and barriers for kindness intervention design

Acts of kindness are powerful drivers of individual well-being, benefitting both the actor and the recipient. Although various design interventions have been introduced to promote acts of kindness, the lack of a comprehensive overview of the critical factors that facilitate or hinder these actions inhibits the design of effective interventions. Consequently, existing interventions do not sufficiently support performing kind acts. To address this gap, we interviewed 12 participants, recognized by their peers for naturally and frequently displaying kindness, to identify the key facilitators and barriers to performing acts of kindness. The generated insights form the basis of an exploratory action-focused framework to guide designers in developing interventions that effectively promote acts of kindness. Our findings highlight the potential of design to effectively stimulate kind acts and provide guidance for designers to foster acts of kindness.