Parent involvement in children’s homework has emerged as an important component of their education. However, this involvement can generate tension between parents and children, particularly when coupled with a heavy workload, potentially exacerbating stress levels in children. Some children desire to express and share their stress with their parents. However, limited emotional regulation abilities and a lack of stress awareness often hinder effective stress management and communication by children. To address this, we designed a stress biofeedback system named Stress Diffuser, comprising a wearable biosensor with interactive embodied devices, that display the child’s stress during homework sessions. The system intends to manage children’s stress by enhancing awareness among both the child and the parent, and influencing their educational strategies and the way of interaction. We conducted experiments with eight families, including primary school children aged eight to eleven and their parents. The results of our quantitative and qualitative analysis indicated that all participants enhanced their stress awareness while using Stress Diffuser during homework. Most parents adjusted their supervisory strategies and interaction styles in response to their children’s stress data. The study sheds light on children’s needs for a designed agent to communicate their stress and regulate their emotions. Furthermore, the study explores the use of interactive biofeedback technology in homework settings with parent involvement. It reveals a favorable influence on facilitating stress management in children and on enhancing the quality of supervision and interaction between children and parents.

Parental involvement is crucial for children’s stress management, and co-regulation of stress can have a positive effect. To facilitate parental involvement in children’s stress management in learning, we proposed an embodied connected system, which provides stress detection, stress information feedback, and encouragement prompts, aiming to help parents better understand and engage in children’s stress-regulation process. This article focuses on the impact of interactive encouragement prompts provided to parents on children’s stress management. The within-group experiment was used to collect stress data and scales from 36 parent–child groups during a controlled learning experiment, and semi-structured interviews were conducted with parents and children. The results indicate that the encouragement prompts provided to the parents enhance the effectiveness of stress relief in children facilitated by parental involvement. In particular, the psychological stress was reduced, and the communication between parents and children became more effective. In addition, active parental involvement and timely encouragement prompts can improve children’s stress-coping abilities, providing an interactive intervention approach for learning stress management.

The optimization of design strategies in loading and waiting scenarios is of great significance for enhancing user experience. This study focuses on the click-to-load waiting scenario in mobile device interfaces and systematically analyzes the user experience performance of three design strategies—the interface type, loading indicator, and layout—across different page transition types (including the tab page, content page, and half-screen overlay). Based on questionnaire responses and experimental data (N = 90) collected from participants aged 20–29, we assessed subjective user perceptions across five validated metrics: time perception, loading speed, satisfaction, emotional valence, and arousal level. The results revealed significant differences among strategies in terms of loading speed perception, time awareness, and emotional responses. Notably, progressive loading strategies proved particularly effective in enhancing user satisfaction and alleviating temporal cognitive load. This study summarizes the characteristics of strategy applicability and proposes general optimization recommendations, offering both theoretical insights and practical guidance for designing loading feedback in mobile device interfaces.

Stress, particularly learning stress, is prevalent among Chinese elementary school children and can lead to severe health and psychological consequences. Unlike adults, these children often lack the self-awareness to recognize their stress levels, particularly in the context of task performance. This deficiency in self-recognition makes it challenging for them to adapt or seek interventions. For further research, we conducted a study involving 87 elementary school children from various cities and counties in China. Through a designed questionnaire, we aimed to understand children's perceptions of stress and how they react to stress, especially when they are learning. Preliminary findings indicate that visualizing stress could be a promising research direction to enhance children's selfawareness. Future studies will delve deeper into determining which types of stress displays most effectively aid children in recognizing and positively adjusting their stress during the learning process.