A Wearable Architecture for Zero-Friction Civic Micro-Participation

• Giuseph Giangareli Fastech College https://orcid.org/0009-0006-9996-1937
• Luana Tavares Fastech College https://orcid.org/0009-0008-7448-2168
• Wellynton Diniz Fastech College https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6268-1513
• Jean Zahn Fastech College https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6636-6836

DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/lasdigov.2026.23694

Resumo

Citizen participation plays an important role in strengthening public management and can be enhanced through digital technologies. However, many existing solutions depend on active interactions, limiting continuous engagement. This work proposes a citizen-sourcing system based on contextual and low-effort interaction, where citizens evaluate urban spaces according to their geographic location using mobile and wearable devices, such as smartwatches. The solution adopts a client-server architecture composed of an API and two Flutter applications (smartphone and wearable). An exploratory user study was conducted using questionnaires based on TAM, SUS, trust, and public value constructs. The results indicate high acceptance regarding usefulness, ease of use, and usability, demonstrating the potential of the approach to reduce participation barriers. However, institutional trust presented greater variability, suggesting that adoption depends not only on technological quality but also on confidence in how public management uses the collected information. The main contributions include a contextual citizen participation model supported by wearable devices and evidence on factors influencing the adoption of citizensourcing solutions in urban environments.

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