Human Computer Interaction and societal impact – Can HCI influence public policy making and IT politics?
Abstract: Research and research funding organizations are becoming more and more aware of the need to conduct research that proves some form of utility to the society and has some form of practical impact. There are several different ways of making research that has practical relevance and that can contribute to changing and improving society. This talk aims at discussing ways to plan, conduct research with the aim of improving the society and also show how we should make use of our research knowledge and positions to influence politics and public policy making.
Short biography:
Jan Gulliksen is a professor in Human Computer Interaction at
KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden. He is
also the Dean of the School of Computer Science and
communication. He is a visiting professor at INSEAD and a
guest professor at Uppsala university. Jan was recently
appointed as chairman of the digital commission of
Sweden’s government, department of enterprise and is
also appointed as the Digital champion of Sweden by the
European commission. He is the chairman of IFIP TC 13 on HCI,
chairman of the NordiCHI collaboration and founder of the
NordiCHI conference series. Jan has conducted a number of
larger Action Research projects with the purpose of increasing
the usability by introducing new user-centred design
methodologies at several public authorities. He has authored
more than 100 publications on these matters. His most recent
research projects cover the moving office – bringing movement
into office work; several projects on ICT supporting mental
and cognitive disabilities; and projects on Digitization and
impact on politics and policy making.
* * *
“Social Computing, HCI, Social Change and Peace”
Abstract: Social Computing can play an important role in facilitating, encouraging and managing social change, conflict management and peace. In this presentation I will present my interest and experience in research at the intersection of HCI and peace building and discuss specific projects I or my research lab was involved with in this area. The difficulty in allowing multiple perspectives about a conflict to come to the surface, the role of socio-political contexts, the challenge in assessing the positive and negative effects of interventions, and how we can best identify the situations where digital technologies can help with peace building will be the main nucleus of my presentation.
Short biography:
Panayiotis Zaphiris is a Professor in the Department of
Multimedia and Graphic Arts and Dean of School of Fine and
Applied Arts at Cyprus University of Technology. Panayiotis
has a PhD in Human-Computer Interaction from Wayne State
University, USA. He also has an MSc in Systems Engineering and
a BSc in Electrical Engineering both from University of
Maryland, College Park, USA. He has worked for a number of
years at the Centre for HCI Design of City University London
where he reached the rank of Reader in HCI. His research
interests are in the area of Human Computer Interaction,
Social Computing and Inclusive Design with an emphasis on the
design of interactive systems for people with disabilities. He
is the co-founder of the Cyprus Interaction Lab (http://www.cyprusinteractionlab.com) and is one of the coordinators of a new online master in
Interaction Design (http://www.idmaster.eu)
