Updates on recent accomplishments, publications, awards, presentations, and media coverage involving Human Centered Design & Engineering (HCDE) faculty, PhD students, and research scientists.
Winter 2026
March 13, 2026
Emily Tseng and Calvin Liang (Northwestern University), with Hanna Barakat, received a Google Academic Research Award (GARA) of $100,000 for “Evaluating Community-Centered and Synthetic Safety Personas with At-Risk Users, Engineers, and Policymakers." Their project will look at whether and how synthetic personas might be appropriate for use in engineering and designing digital safety, through a case study with queer youth.
Hyeonjeong Byeon and Gary Hsieh, with co-author Uran Oh, had a paper, Understanding the Effects of Conversational Agent Personality on the Credibility of LLM-Based Conversational Search, published in the Proceedings of the 2026 Conference on Human Information Interaction and Retrieval (CHIIR '26).
K. J. Kevin Feng, with co-authors Rock Yuren Pang, Shangbin Feng, Chu Li, Weijia Shi, Yulia Tsvetkov, Jeffrey Heer, and Katharina Reinecke, had a paper, Interactive Reasoning: Visualizing and Controlling Chain-of-Thought Reasoning in Large Language Models, published in the Proceedings of the 31st International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces (IUI '26).
Danli Luo, with co-authors Wade Ingram and Andreea Danielescu had a paper, From Piping to Printing: An Action-Based Approach to Computational Food Fabrication, published in the Proceedings of the Twentieth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction (TEI '26).
Sean Munson, with co-authors Chi-shan Tsai, HyunHae Lee, Warren Szewczyk, Julia K Palmer, Sophie Putnam, Jaimee L Heffner, Alexi Vasbinder, Amandalynne Paullada, Weichao Yuwen, Kerryn W Reding, had a paper, Exploring Feature Priorities and User Needs in Developing Virtual Study Assistants, published in JMIR Formative Research.
Daniela Rosner had an essay, On Apps and Appliqué, published in e-flux Architecture.
Chenjie Yuan and Ruican Zhong, with co-authors Longjie Guo, Mingyuan Zhong, Robert Wolfe, Yue Xu, Bingbing Wen, Hua Shen, Lucy Lu Wang, and Alexis Hiniker, had a paper, SusBench: An Online Benchmark for Evaluating Dark Pattern Susceptibility of Computer-Use Agents, published in the Proceedings of the 31st International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces (IUI '26).
Brock Craft is featured in the UW Daily article, What is human centered design & engineering?
Kate Starbird is quoted in the Tech Policy Press piece, Despite Using Iranian Meddling to Justify War, Trump Axes Election Defenses.
February 27, 2026
Katya Cherukumilli was awarded $27,500 by the Lead Exposure Elimination Project (LEEP) for “Assessing lead contamination of drinking water supplies in primary schools and households in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, India.”
Katya Cherukumilli was also awarded $15,000 by the University of Washington Global Innovation Fund (GIF) for “Assessing lead contamination of drinking water supplies in schools and households in India.”
Shana Hirsch, with co-authors Yin Cheong Aden Ip, Pedro F. P. Brandão-Dias, Elizabeth Andruszkiewicz Allan, and Ryan Kelly, had a paper, Understanding practical barriers to the global adoption of environmental DNA (eDNA) methods, tools, and standards, published in BMC Research Notes.
Nadya Peek, with co-authors, Harley Quinn, Gregory A. Robben, Zhaoyi Zheng, Jin Yan, Yuanzhi Li, Zhaoji Yang, Maria Politi, Lilo Pozzo, Jörg G. Werner, and Keith A. Brown, had a paper, An automated system for electrodeposition of polymer thin films and their wetting analysis, published in Review of Scientific Instruments.
Yuecheng Peng, with co-authors, Jerry Cao, Hongrui Wu, Yuxuan Miao, Sanjana Satagopan, Runxin Shi, Brier Hehmeyer, Brett Emery, Jeffrey Lipton, Jennifer Mankoff, and Shwetak Patel, had an abstract, Demonstrating SensiPrint: 3D-Printed Soft Foams for Physical Augmentation and Sensing, published in the Adjunct Proceedings of the 10th ACM Symposium on Computational Fabrication (SCF Adjunct '25).
Brett Halperin was a speaker on the roundtable “Interviewing Industry Professionals” organized by the Media Industries SIG of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies (SCMS).
Kate Starbird was:
- quoted in The Boston Globe article, When posting becomes its own style of politics
- mentioned in the New York Times article, Is ‘Slopulism’ Shaping Our Politics?
February 6, 2026
Aayushi Dangol, Akeiylah Dewitt, Julie Kientz, and Sayamindu Dasgupta, with co-authors Robert Wolfe and Ben Chickadel, had a paper, Reading AI and Reading the World: Using an Interactive AI System to Promote Children's Understanding of AI Bias, published in ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction.
Julie Kientz with co-authors Seray Ibrahim, Julia Dabrowski, Alissa N. Antle, Alexandra Chesters, and Petr Slovák, had a paper, Uncovering Parental Struggles: Using Digital Probes to Analyse Challenges in Applying Online Parenting Content, published in ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction.
Nina Lutz and Kate Starbird are quoted in the CNN article, How four faces changed the way many Americans see Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Kate Starbird is quoted in the New York Times article, Nick Shirley, the influencer who spurred the federal crackdown in Minneapolis.
Kate Starbird is quoted in the Christian Science Monitor article, Videos showed Alex Pretti’s death – and undercut the government’s version of events.
January 23, 2026
Kate Starbird has been named a Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), one of the most prestigious honors in the computing profession. Dr. Starbird was recognized for her contributions to understanding and improving information ecosystems, including during crisis events and addressing misinformation.
Cecilia Aragon and Kimberly Perkins received a CoMotion Innovation Gap Fund grant of $75,000 in support of “CRMSON: Human Performance Hub.”
Shana Hirsch, with co-authors Andrés M. Cisneros-Montemayor, Trent Dillon, Pedro C. González-Espinosa, Marcia Moreno-Báez, Mohammad Nasir Tighsazzadeh and Yoshitaka Ota, had a paper, Ocean renewable energy for equitable energy access in a Blue Economy, published in Scientific Reports.
Georgia Kenderova and Sean Munson, with co-author Eleanor Birrell, had a paper, “It’s Always in the Back of My Mind”: Navigating sensitive health data amid reduced abortion rights in the United States, published in the ACM Transactions on Computing for Healthcare.
Megan Moldestad, with co-authors Sarah Keithly, Paige Perry, Erica J. Ho, Ryan A. Sterling, Soumya Subramaniam, Shaina Coogan, Sarah E. Shirley, George Sayre, Christian Helfrich, Charles Maynard, Catherine P. Kaminetzky, Erin L. Patel, Joseph Chiovaro, Joel Schmidt, Rebecca Stout, Amber Fisher, and Edwin S. Wong, had a paper, The VA Rural Interprofessional Faculty Development Initiative: a qualitative evaluation guided by the RE-AIM framework, published in BMC Medical Education.
Andrew Quitmeyer (HCDE Affiliate Faculty), with co-authors Kit Quitmeyer and Sid Drmay, published the Proceedings of the Third Digital Naturalism Conference about interaction design and field biology.
Donghoon Shin, with co-authors Seojin Hwang, Yumin Kim, Byeongjeong Kim, and Hwanhee Lee, had a paper, Personality Editing for Language Models through Adjusting Self-Referential Queries, accepted to the 19th Conference of the European Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics (EACL 2026, main track).
Kate Starbird published a Center for an Informed Public (CIP) blog post, Framing the killing of Renee Nicole Good.
Sourojit Ghosh was quoted in the CNET article, Elon Musk's Grok faces scrutiny over nonconsensual AI-altered 'undressed' images.
January 9, 2026
Tyler Fox received supplemental research funding in the amount of $120,000 from Microsoft Customer Experience & Success. This research explores design based competencies in relation to ambiguity and AI.
Emily Tseng, Matthew Bilik, and Amy Zhang received a grant of $25,000 from the Center for an Informed Public (CIP) Innovation Fund for “Building an AI Cooperative With and For Journalists.”
Kyra Arnett, with co-authors Madou Tapsoba, Wamdaogo Moussa Guelbeogo, Antoine Sanou, Soumanaba Zongo, Christelle Gogue, Siaka Debe, Kelly Davis, Jenny Shannon, Peder Digre, Julia Mwesigwa, Kenzie Tynuv, Christen Fornadel, Sagnon N’Falé, Molly Robertson, Joseph D. Challenger, Gauthier Tougri, Adama Gansané, Hilary Ranson, Gnankiné Olivier and Joseph Wagman, had an article, Differential effects of dual and synergist-based insecticide-treated bed nets on pyrethroid resistance and L995F/S knockdown resistance mutation dynamics in Anopheles gambiae s.l. populations in south-western Burkina Faso, published in Parasites & Vectors.
Ruiqi Chen, with co-authors Qingyang He, Hanxi Bao, Jung Choi, and Xin Tong, had an article, GestoBrush: Facilitating Graffiti Artists’ Digital Creation Experiences through Embodied AR Interactions, published in the Proceedings of the 18th International Symposium on Visual Information Communication and Interaction (VINCI '25).
Soobin Cho, Anna Lindner, Joseph Schafer, Pitch Sinlapanuntakul, Julie Vera, and Mark Zachry had a poster, Collaborative Autoethnography as a Method to Explore Short-Lived Social AI Chatbots, published in the Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction (HAI '25).
Shana Hirsch, with co-authors, Yin Cheong Aden Ip, Elizabeth Andruszkiewicz Allan, and Ryan P Kelly, had a article, Fast, Flexible, Feasible: A Transparent Framework for Evaluating eDNA Workflow Trade-offs in Resource-Limited Settings, published in Molecular Ecology Resources.
Ayumi Oishi with co-authors Annuska Zolyomi, LouAnne Boyd, Mizuko (Mimi) Ito, had an article, Exploring HCI Neurodiversity Research in Japan: Lessons Learned in Cross-Cultural Relationship Building and Community-Based Research, published in ACM Interactions.
Kate Starbird, with co-authors Danielle Lee Tomson, Mert Can Bayar, Michael Grass, and Emma Spiro, published Being Sensemakers: A Framework for University-Based Rapid Research of Elections, Crisis Events, and Beyond, a report detailing the 2024 Election Rumor Research Project.
Brett Halperin was interviewed on national television, NewsNation Live, on December 10, 2025, about the future of Hollywood and recent backlash to the creator behind “AI actress” Tilly Norwood.
Nina Lutz was quoted in the Time article, How Christian Leaders Are Challenging the AI Boom.
Kate Starbird was quoted in the NPR article, Pro-Trump influencers take a victory lap amid fallout from viral video alleging fraud.