•   When: Thursday, June 02, 2022 from 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM
  •   Speakers: Andruid Kerne
  •   Location: ZOOM only
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Abstract:

Creativity and participation are vital, ineffable aspects of human experience. Creativity is key for personal well-being and national innovation. Participation is essential to well-being, learning, and democracy. At the same time, performing scientific investigation of new technologies that support human experiences of creativity and participation is challenging, because they are nonlinear processes, characterized neither by singular correct answers nor by a one and only best practice. This complicates the role of data in establishing evidence and verifying findings. We need to understand what data methodologies enable what types of rigorous investigation of the effects of new technologies on human beings.
 
We present a series of studies exploring how new technologies impact creativity and participation, using data methodologies as an epistemological lens. The technologies span social media, spatial representations of information collections, algorithm-in-the-loop, embodied interaction, and games. Situated contexts of use span entertainment, crisis response, and education, involving engineering, architecture, and media arts. In formulating an epistemology of data, we contribute findings of the need for visual and textual qualitative data methodologies, in addition to quantitative, for studying the impacts of new technologies on ineffable aspects of human experience.
 

Bio:

Andruid Kerne is a transdisciplinary human-computer interaction researcher and educator focused on creativity, design, embodiment, social computing, participation, diversity, and inclusion. He is a program director in the Information and Intelligent Systems division of the National Science Foundation, where he works in the Human-Centered Computing, Future of Work at the Human-Technology Frontier, Ethical and Responsible Research, Computer and Information Science and Engineering Community Research Infrastructure, and Emerging Technologies for Teaching and Learning programs. 

Andruid is also Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at Texas A&M University. His Interface Ecology Lab [https://ecologylab.net] traverses boundaries among fields to perform transdisciplinary research with the goal of empowering humanity in its often fraught relationships with technology. Interface Ecology Lab is known for its work on using spatial media to support ideation and communication with information collections and video, evaluation methods for creativity support, and diverse people's needs for community on social media platforms. He holds a B.A. in applied mathematics / electronic media from Harvard, an M.A. in music composition from Wesleyan, and a Ph.D. in computer science from NYU. He has published over 100 papers and raised over $3M in research funding. Andruid is a member of the steering committee of ACM Creativity and Cognition.

Posted 2 years, 5 months ago