Games Research
Games as a Research
Platform and Focus
Computer and videogames are an increasingly
important aspect of the media landscape, with growing
social and economic impact. Game designers have been
innovating new forms of interaction, and creating new
paradigms for HCI. The availability of dynamic user
modeling and alternative input modalities driven by
gaming applications, and the trend toward large online
communities of players and new forms of co-located and
pervasive play, have created opportunities for researchers
interested in basic questions about human communication
and interaction to test theories and form new models
of interaction strategies.
In the Games Research Lab, we focus
on games-related HCI, and on the use of computer and
videogames as a platform for research on human communication
and social strategies and interaction.
Application areas include the improvement
of productivity-oriented interfaces, enhancement of
mediated communication in business and leisure contexts,
and iteration and evolution of our basic understanding
of human social and communication practices. Our research
also feeds back into the development of games and game-like
interactions for contexts such as healthcare and training.
Social, Emotional
and Physical Approaches to HCI
As contexts for computer-driven interactions
shift from the office to include everyday usage in the
home and in the outside world, strategies for understanding
effective design are also shifting. There is a growing
recognition within the HCI community of the importance
of social and emotional qualities of interactions with
systems that support these usage contexts. Affective
and social computing require new strategies for evaluation
in support of producing helpful and appropriate design
solutions.
The Friendly Media project explores
alternative interaction paradigms as well as evaluation
techniques that help to elucidate the social and emotional
qualities of systems. Special attention is paid to forms
of social expression not traditionally included in HCI
practices, such as physical interaction and peripheral
cues of social presence.
