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Research

Mark Zachry


Spring 2026

AR Face Filters in Online Interviews: Data Collection and Performance-Scoring Tools

Instructors:

  • Anna Lindner, PhD Student
  • Mark Zachry, Faculty Advisor

This Directed Research Group (DRG) is hands-on research examining whether AR face filters influence performance outcomes in high-stakes online interviews. Students will help execute the full study workflow (participant recruitment, scheduling, and some will facilitate interview sessions), develop a lightweight AI-assisted scoring tool that evaluates participant performance transcripts, and contribute to background research, preliminary analysis, and write-up that situates the study within prior work.

Students participating in this DRG can expect to:

  • Conduct background research on AR face filters, professional self-presentation, and interview-performance evaluation, and may contribute to synthesis of findings.
  • Support end-to-end data collection, including recruitment, scheduling, and running interview sessions with participants.
  • Contribute to preliminary analysis and to the design, testing, and validation of an AI-supported performance-scoring workflow to enable consistent, scalable evaluation of interview outcomes.

Enrollment information:

  • To apply, please complete this short form.
  • Meeting time: Wednesdays, 3:30 – 5:00 p.m.
  • Credits: 2 credits (i.e., 6 total hours per week, including a meeting and outside work).
  • Questions: Email Anna Lindner at aclindn@uw.edu
  • Deadline: Apply for this DRG by March 20 (11:59pm) by filling out the survey above. We expect to select and notify participants by March 27, 2026.


Spring 2026

Designing Experiences and Futures Beyond AI Harm

Directed by: Pitch Sinlapanuntakul (PhD candidate) and advised by Mark Zachry (Faculty advisor)

AI systems can produce unintended harms that are difficult to predict or fully prevent, but designers play a formative role in shaping the concepts and experiences that guide how the products of these systems are built. This DRG focuses on the design of AI experiences, while ensuring that concepts are grounded in human-centered and value-sensitive thinking. Students do not need to build or code AI systems; prototypes can be conceptual, interactive, or optionally AI-enabled, depending on the idea.

Over the quarter, students will lead their own design projects (individually or in pairs), taking ideas from initial sketches to prototypes while iterating and refining based on design critiques along the way. Principles and early analysis of existing harmful AI products will provide inspiration and context, but the main focus is on ideation, making, and hands-on design exploration.

Each project will culminate in a polished AI design concept and supporting artifacts suitable for submission to a design competition or short research-through-design paper. This DRG provides a hands-on opportunity to practice creative design thinking while producing portfolio-ready work that demonstrates how thoughtful design can guide safer AI experiences.

Enrollment information

This DRG is at capacity for Spring 2026 and no longer accepting applications.

  • Meeting time: Wednesdays, 3 – 4:30 pm.
  • Credits: 2 credits (i.e., 6 total hours per week, including a meeting and outside work).
  • Questions: Email Pitch Sinlapanuntakul at wspitch@uw.edu

Dr. Zachry's research group archive