'Happiness': Can pervasive computing assist students to achieve success?

Computing is traditionally used in higher education with fairly static configurations (fixed equipment, location and access times), but a range of powerful, sensor-rich, mobile devices are now widely available. Furthermore, the majority of current university students are highly digitally-literate, therefore the adoption of mobile technology to facilitate their learning is an interesting potential development. Such a shift, besides providing enhanced access to learning resources, could offer a greater understanding of student behaviour which could then be used to help students, e.g. by prompting them into adopting behaviour likely to increase their chances of academic success. We have explored the existing use of context-aware technologies in education, and we will study the behaviour of higher-education students in order to inform a behavioural intervention in future studies.