Title: How to run a design-forward HCI/HRI lab

Speaker: Wendy Ju (Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute (Cornell Tech))

When: April 20, 11h  |  coffee break 10:30

Where: Ciências ULisboa, C6.3.27

Invited by: Isabel Neto

Abstract: In this talk on “How to run a design-forward HCI/HRI lab “, Wendy Ju will discuss the design theory and its applications in research, how the design process happen by asking the right questions, and how to explore sustainable and purposeful lab practices, focusing on design as a tool for inquiry on how to structure studies, build prototypes, and ask the right questions to understand what users truly need. Wendy Ju will share her own experience in establishing and running a design-forward lab in Cornell-tech, and how she and her team develop research questions through prototyping and create purpose-driven interactive systems. This talk is part of a 2-days workshop entitled “From Question to Prototype: Design Thinking for Interaction Research” that emphasizes users as experts in their own lives; and reflects on our role as researchers to design the right inquiries and tools to reveal insights about human needs and behaviors.

Bio: Wendy Ju is a Full Professor at the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech and the Technion and has a secondary affiliation in the faculty of Architecture and Town Planning at Technion-Israel. She is a member of the Information Science field at Cornell University. Dr. Ju comes to Cornell Tech from the Center for Design Research at Stanford University, where she was Executive Director of Interaction Design Research, and from the California College of the Arts, where she was an Associate Professor of Interaction Design in the Design MFA program. Her work in the areas of human-robot interaction and automated vehicle interfaces highlights the ways that interactive devices can communicate and engage people without interrupting or intruding. Dr. Ju has innovated numerous methods for early-stage prototyping of automated systems to understand how people will respond to systems before the systems are built. She has a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford, and a Master’s in Media Arts and Sciences from MIT. Her monograph on The Design of Implicit Interactions was published in 2015. More details on her research and publications are available at Wendy Ju.