Winter – Spring 2025
Co-speculating Care-ful Data Infrastructures with Home Child Care Workers
Instructors: Neilly Tan, Sean Munson, Audrey Desjardins (on leave)
Smart home cameras' varied promises–to increase security, care, and convenience–belie critical tensions about social configurations of power, surveillance, and privacy in home settings.
This DRG addresses the impacts of data-driven monitoring with labor conditions in domestic spaces. With a specific focus around the experiences of nannies and other in-home child care workers, this research group explores the following questions:
- What are alternative structures for collective accountability around critical technology use?
- How can values of care and interdependence inform privacy in domestic labor contexts?
Across two quarters (Winter and Spring 2025), students will develop and co-facilitate a participatory, speculative design research workshop with in-home child care workers. Ultimately, this hands-on DRG will result in the co-creation of design resource materials (e.g., zines, manifestos, booklets) that engage specific applications of consent, negotiation, and disclosure around varied social settings and audiences. Through this process, students will contribute to both practical and theoretical implications of privacy.
This research group will cover the following broad agenda:
- Winter quarter: Students will closely read across design research methods and theory, creating and crafting workshop protocols alongside this foundational knowledge. During this time, students will also assist in participant recruitment, running pilot workshops, and developing community relationships.
Depending on study progress, students can expect to co-facilitate the design workshop by the end of Winter quarter or beginning of Spring quarter.
- Spring quarter: Following the design workshop's completion, students will collaborate on data analysis and creating design materials.
Students should apply with the expectation of a two-quarter commitment. However, we understand that other priorities–such as spring quarter course conflicts–could prevent some individuals from returning in spring.
Enrollment information
- Meeting time: Weekly meeting times will be jointly determined based on student availability via a scheduling poll sent out with DRG acceptance notifications.
- Credits: 2-3 credits (e.g., 6-9 hours total of meeting and outside work)
- Who should apply: We encourage applicants from HCDE, Design, Information Science, and fields related to policy and community-based engagement (e.g., Social Work, Labor Studies). Our research group will comprise 3-5 students who may have varied design or research abilities, but who are all committed to learning from one another.
The following relevant experience is highly preferred (though we do not expect you to meet all such criteria):- Background or interest in Participatory design, Speculative design, Community-based research
- Graphic design, Interaction design/making expertise
- Qualitative research experience/aptitude
This DRG counts toward the directed research requirement for PhD students.
- To apply: Please complete this Google Form by December 18.
- Anticipated notification date: We expect to notify students by December 27 or earlier.
- Questions? Students should email Neilly Tan (nhtan@uw.edu) with questions.
Winter 2025
Leveraging role-playing games to support mental health
Instructors:
- Sean Munson
- Georgia Kenderova
- Nisha Devasia
Description:
Tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) can be leveraged to help build social and emotional skills and support mental health by fostering empathy, building community, and providing a safe space for experimentation and identity play.
In this DRG, we will read and become acquainted with literature on game-based learning, such as games for learning social and emotional skills (with a focus on developing mental health skills), game narrative design, narrative immersion, learning and behavioral change theories, and other related topics. Ideally, we will also look at multiple existing RPG systems, RPG mechanics, campaigns/storylines, and play and analyze a few of those games to aid our understanding of how they function and inform the design of a future study.
Outcomes:
- Reading and discussing academic literature; learning about how games can support building social and emotional skills and mental health.
- Contribute to the design of a research study (e.g., scoping research questions, research sketches, etc.).
- Understand how immersive narratives and game mechanics work and opportunity to create ones ourselves.
Enrollment information
- Meeting time: Meeting time will be determined based on student availability.
- Some options:
- Tuesday: 2:30-4:30 pm
- Tuesday: 4-6 pm
- Wednesday: 3-5 pm
- Thursday: 3-5 pm
- Thursday: 3:30-5:30 pm
- Credits: 2-3 credits (2-hour group meetings and about 4-5 hours of additional work/week)
- Who should apply:
- 3-5 students (undergraduate or graduate)
- Interest in game research, specifically game-based learning, and/or designin interventions to support mental health; experience with playing TTRPGs or other narrative-based games not required but appreciated!
- Completed basic coursework in HCDE or other related field (e.g., iSchool).
- Experience with conducting literature reviews and a basic understanding of research methods.
- This DRG counts toward the directed research requirement for PhD students.
- To apply: Please complete this Google Form by December 2.
- Anticipated notification date: December 8, 2024
- Questions? Contact Georgia at gak98@uw.edu