Date: Wednesday, March 12; 4:00 - 5:00p

Location: 301 College Ave, Seminar Rm.

Note: 3:45 - 4:00p will be our reception, in the Snap Lab of 301 College Ave. After the talk, there will be a follow-up reception from 5:00 - 5:15p, also in the Snap Lab.

Abstract:

People are faced with many decisions regarding their personal and family health and wellness, such as personal nutrition and exercise or ensuring a child is on track developmentally. Many times such decisions are made without high confidence due to insufficient evidence or lack of input from all people affected by the outcome. Decision support systems have a long history within computing and information sciences and have been crucial to helping workplaces process large amounts of data to come to a conclusion. However, there has been little application of these techniques to less structured, informal decision-making, mainly due to their complexity, higher learning curve, and time required to gather input.

Computing technology designed to embed seamlessly into existing practices can improve confidence in everyday decisions by enabling the capture of more data, providing opportunities to access and reflect on data, and encouraging collaboration. In this talk, I will present two examples of technologies I have designed, developed, and evaluated through long-term deployments that were used to help in decision-making for caregivers of children. These examples include supporting therapy for children with autism and helping parents and pediatricians track developmental progress in young children. I will discuss results that show these technologies can improve collaboration and increase reliance on evidence in decision-making and then reflect on how lessons learned from these examples can be applied more broadly.

Bio:

Julie A. Kientz is a Ph.D. Candidate in Computer Science in the School of Interactive Computing and GVU Center at the Georgia Institute of Technology. She is advised by Dr. Gregory D. Abowd and is a member of the Ubiquitous Computing Research Group. Her research interests center primarily in the area of Human-Computer Interaction, especially Ubiquitous Computing and Computer-Supported Cooperative Work. In particular, she is interested in determining how novel computing applications can address important social issues, such as autism and children’s health, and evaluating those applications through long-term, real world deployment studies.

For more information, please contact Phoebe Sengers

[schedule]

3-11-2008 Sarah