This page contains an archive of the past five years of Directed Research Groups led by Professor Cecilia Aragon. View her currently offered DRGs »
- Exploring Engagement with Virtual Pet Sites
- Building Resilience & Successful Mental Health Initiatives
- Research into the Harms caused by GAI Tools
- Exploring Engagement with Virtual Pet Sites
- Human-Centered Data Science and Large Language Models
- A Systematic Literature Review of Research on Recommender Systems
- Research Design for Games to Teach Data Ethics
- Comparing Content Recommendations based on User-Centered Content Analysis
- Data Visualization and Analytics for Diversity and Inclusion Research
- Turning Visualization Research into Product: Traffigram
- Human-Centered Natural Language Processing and Text Visualization
- Exploring Positionality in Qualitative Coding
- Safety Culture for Professional Pilots
- Research Design for Games to Teach Data Ethics
- Human Centered Natural Language Processing and Text Visualization
- Emotions and Relationship-Building in Online Fanfiction Communities
- Human Centered Natural Language Processing and Text Visualization
- Human Centered Natural Language Processing
Exploring Engagement with Virtual Pet Sites
Instructors: Alyse Marie Allred, Cecilia Aragon
Virtual pet sites, such as Neopets, are browser games built around the core mechanic of collecting digital pets, often with additional features such as: minigames, forums, contests, dress-ups, and a tradesmarket. Although they rose to prominence in the early 2000s, virtual pet sites persist to this day. Moreover, while the original trend was associated primarily with children, many of the current users of these sites are adults--some of whom were the original children who have since grown up. This DRG seeks to understand how adults interact with and play in these virtual worlds, especially in comparison to prior observations of children in these spaces. Participants will be expected to make both passive observations and to actively engage with the site's core mechanics, guided by their own curiosity and enjoyment.
This DRG is a continuation of a project launched in Spring 2024, with the intent to use the combined data in an academic research paper.
What students should expect:
- Joining one of three virtual pet sites (Neopets, Flight Rising, Dappervolk)
Independently playing at least 30 minutes, four days of the week (2 hours playtime total) - Weekly short written reflections (1-3 paragraphs) relaying activities, observations, and other significant interactions
- Weekly slide(s) documenting pets, avatars, screencaps, and other significant visual artifacts
- Weekly 1 hour meetings (TBD) wherein students will share and compare their experiences and observations of the previous week
- Full reflections at midterms and finals
For questions, please contact: Alyse Marie Allred at alyse.allred@gmail.com.
Building Resilience & Successful Mental Health Initiatives
Instructors: Research scientist Kimberly Perkins, PhD, and Professor Cecilia Aragon
As part of this Directed Research Group (DRG), participants will conduct a comprehensive literature review and meta-analysis focused on two key areas:
- Successful interventions supporting mental health initiatives.
- Strategies for building individual mental resilience and integrating resilience into broader organizational systems.
This work involves systematic literature searches, data synthesis, and critical analysis to identify patterns across various workplace mental health interventions. The group will assess how these interventions can be effectively operationalized at a systems level to enhance both individual well-being and organizational resilience.
Participants will also contribute to developing a foundational framework that links mental health initiatives with systemic implementation strategies, exploring how resilience at the individual level can enhance the adaptive capacity of entire organizations.
What might be group and individual outcomes of this work?
Group Outcomes:
- Publication of a meta-analysis on mental health interventions, particularly applicable for the workplace, identifying key success factors and trends.
- Development of an academic framework that bridges individual resilience with systemic organizational strategies.
- Contributions to high-impact academic publications and/or potential conference presentations.
- Interdisciplinary collaboration across fields such as psychology, human factors, organizational behavior, and resilience research.
Individual Outcomes:
- Experience in meta-analytic methodologies and systematic literature reviews.
- Deepened understanding of mental health resilience research and its application to workplace settings.
- Opportunity to contribute to academic publications, strengthening research credentials.
- Collaboration with fellow students in related fields, building professional and academic networks.
This DRG provides an opportunity for students and researchers to engage in meaningful, interdisciplinary work that has the potential to shape workplace policy, inform best practices, and contribute to long-term organizational resilience strategies.
Research into the Harms caused by GAI Tools
This year-long DRG will explore various facets of working with Generative AI tools, with a specific focus on the ways in which their outputs can and do cause harm towards traditionally marginalized populations. Led by doctoral candidate Sourojit Ghosh, students in this DRG will be expected to conduct impactful novel research in this field and submit high-quality work to relevant conferences for publication. The DRG will have biweekly large-group meetings on Tuesdays from 12-1:30 p.m. (Fall quarter, Winter and Spring times TBD), as well as small group meetings scheduled throughout the year. Students can enroll for a maximum of 5 credits throughout the academic year, distributing them as they see fit over three quarters.
Exploring Engagement with Virtual Pet Sites
Organizers: Alyse Marie Allred, Cecilia Aragon
Virtual pet sites, such as Neopets, are browser games built around the core mechanic of collecting digital pets, often with additional features such as: minigames, forums, contests, dress-ups, and a tradesmarket. Although they rose to prominence in the early 2000s, virtual pet sites persist to this day. Moreover, while the original trend was associated primarily with children, many of the current users of these sites are adults--some of whom were the original children who have since grown up. This DRG seeks to understand how adults interact and play with these virtual pet sites, as a point of comparison to existing ethnographic data on how children engage with them. The goal is to produce a paper summarizing the findings and submitting it to a conference or journal. Co-authorship on the paper is a possibility for motivated and engaged students.
What students should expect:
- Joining one of four virtual pet sites (Neopets, Flight Rising, Dappervolk, Lorwolf)
- Independently playing at least 30 minutes, three days of the week (1.5 hours playtime total)
- Weekly short reflections (1-3 paragraphs) relaying activities, observations, and other significant interactions
- Weekly 2 hour meetings with the team to share work and discuss observations (meeting time TBD)
- Full reflections at midterms and finals
For questions, please contact: Alyse Allred at alyse.allred@gmail.com.
Human-Centered Data Science and Large Language Models
This year-long Directed Research Group will explore questions in the field of human-centered data science, as it relates to the development, usability, evaluation and social impacts of the recent proliferation of large language models. Students will lead and participate in original research projects, as they discuss novel and impactful questions in the field by designing and executing their own studies. Students will be working directly with PhD candidate Sourojit Ghosh (G).
A Systematic Literature Review of Research on Recommender Systems
Led by Sourojit Ghosh, HCDE PhD Candidate
Advised by Cecilia Aragon, HCDE Professor
The goal for this 3-credit DRG is to conduct a systematic literature review of research on recommender systems, to establish a comprehensive understanding of how researchers and designers of recommender systems define "success" in their work. Students who join the DRG will receive the experience of working on a full research project, from start to finish, which will be submitted to a conference at the end of the quarter.
Participants in this DRG will need to be available on Tuesdays at 11 a.m. and commit to closely reading and analyzing a body of academic research papers. Additionally, they will be expected to contribute to the writing and preparing of the submission.
We are looking for 6-8 students (grad or undergrad) who meet the following qualifications:
- Able to manage a heavy research-reading load throughout the quarter.
- Able to commit to at least 6 hours of work a week (including DRG meetings).
Autumn 2022 - Spring 2023
Research Design for Games to Teach Data Ethics
Co-directed by Cecilia Aragon, Bernease Herman, and Sarah Evans
This research group will co-design a game, along with faculty and students from the University of North Texas (UNT), a Hispanic-Serving Institution, to explore issues of ethics and diversity in data science. Students will be hands-on in exploring examples of educational games, brainstorming and providing ideas for games, creating prototypes, and playtesting. Some themes we may consider include data privacy, trust of algorithmic systems, predictive policing, fairness, and others. Our goal is to produce a working prototype of a game, playtest it, and study our own design processes to gain insight into how conflicts in norms and culture may change the learning process.
This will be a two-quarter (with option to continue for the full year) directed research group with the goal of writing and submitting a paper to a top venue in spring 2023. All group members will be offered the opportunity to be co-authors on the paper.
We are looking for a relatively small group of people who are each interested in between 2 and 5 credit hours of credit/no credit grade in HCDE 496/596 for Fall, Winter, and Spring Quarters in 2022-2023. Interested undergraduate and graduate students may apply. Graphic design experience and familiarity with a wide variety of games is recommended but not required for motivated students.
Comparing Content Recommendations based on User-Centered Content Analysis
In this 2-credit DRG, we are looking for 2-5 students for a research project which intends to compare content recommendation processes for designing social recommender systems. Group members will analyze user-generated content on online fanfiction communities and provide content recommendations to direct users to consume. Some prior experience with qualitative coding or content analysis is preferred, but not required.
Data Visualization and Analytics for Diversity and Inclusion Research
Co-directed by Kimberly Perkins and Cecilia Aragon
Did you know that 95% of airline pilots are men? Did you know that 94% are white? We don’t know the LGBTQI+ percentages because nobody asked.
This research explores why a demographic majority persists despite the industry being open to diversity more than 50 years ago. PhD student Kimberly Perkins has collected over 26,500 answered survey questions (both text and quantitative) from pilots in leadership roles at one major airline based in the United States. The DRG will focus on data cleaning and using Tableau to gain insights and prepare data visualizations from this data set.
Students must have extensive experience with Tableau and data cleaning. Completion of HCDE 411, HCDE 511, or similar data visualization/analysis class is a plus.
We are looking for a relatively small group of people who are each interested in between 2 and 5 credit hours of credit/no credit grade in HCDE 496/596 for Winter Quarter 2023. Interested undergraduate and graduate students may apply. Successful completion of this research may result in co-authorship of an academic paper.
Turning Visualization Research into Product: Traffigram
This DRG will be led by UW CSE alum/Microsoft software engineer Ken Aragon and HCDE professor Cecilia Aragon.
Are you interested in the process through which a novel visualization algorithm is taken from research prototype to viable product? Do you think interactive maps could be improved by combining the science of visual perception with efficient algorithms?
Work with industry engineers and HCDE faculty to turn novel visualization techniques sponsored by UW’s CoMotion Labs into a marketable product. Participants will have the opportunity to work in areas such as user research, design, and software engineering.
Preference will be given to those with proficiency in programming/software development, data visualization, usability testing, design, or entrepreneurship. Meetings will take place once a week on campus at a time (most likely late afternoon) that best suits all participants’ needs. We are looking for a team of 5-6 dedicated students with a variety of skills and backgrounds to work together with the ultimate goal of creating a viable and successful product.
More information about the research can be found here: Human-Centered Data Science Lab » Traffigram: A Design Methodology for Distance Cartograms.
Human-Centered Natural Language Processing and Text Visualization
This research group will apply human-centered techniques in the fields of natural language processing (NLP) and visualization to study very large text corpora, with a specific focus on text visualization. We’re looking for students with experience in either (a) programming and analysis of large text datasets or (b) machine learning and data science. Data visualization or NLP experience is a plus but not required.
Exploring Positionality in Qualitative Coding
This 2-credit DRG will take students through the process of qualitative coding of data. Students will be asked to perform open coding on datasets, and meet to discuss agreements/disagreements as they work towards formulating a codebook. As they code, they will be asked to consider how their own positionalities affect their interpretation of data, and what external contexts they applied in their work. The DRG will meet on Wednesdays, 10 a.m. - 12 noon.
We are looking for 5-7 students with little or no prior experience with qualitative coding, but interest in qualitative research. If you are interested, please email Sourojit Ghosh (ghosh100@uw.edu) with a brief statement of intent, CV and unofficial transcript. Please use the subject line "Interest in Positionality in Qualitative Coding DRG:<your name>.
Safety Culture for Professional Pilots
This research group investigates the interactions between socio-cultural issues and the construction and maintenance of a safety culture for professional pilots in the US aviation industry. These interactions will be explored via several methods, including grounded theory explorations of survey data and trace ethnography as well as a genealogy of literature in the safety systems field.
We will explore the tension between ideas of excellence and competence which are embedded in gendered understandings and prioritize individual pilots against the understanding in the safety systems world that safety is achieved collectively–specifically in our early investigations we discovered that reactions to collective definitions of excellence and competence were highly gendered. Shifts in safety culture which stress the importance of revealing power dynamics which were previously invisible seem to produce a community threat response to protect traditional or historical ways of piloting. Changes to safety culture are politicized as socially progressive changes to the culture at large, and the culture at large becomes a reservoir for tools and mechanisms for reinforcing the hegemonic status quo.
The goal of this research group is to write a paper to submit at a top venue. All members of the group will be offered the opportunity to be co-authors on the paper. Themes for the paper may include but are not limited to: the collective ethos of professional pilots in the United States; individualist propensities as a threat to collective safety systems; gender as a lens of threat response to traditionalism or historical preservation; or, politicking as a form of silencing equity.
This DRG will contain a subgroup to learn Python and use it to extract specific data points to augment the overall research.
This is a closed DRG and will not be accepting applications. The group will meet either via zoom or in-person on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, or Thursdays for two-hour blocks based on members’ availability. This DRG will be 3-6 credit hours of credit/no credit grade in HCDE 496 (undergrads) /596 (grads) for the Spring Quarter in 2022.
Research Design for Games to Teach Data Ethics
Co-directed by Cecilia Aragon, Sarah Evans, Bernease Herman, and Andrea Figueroa
This research group will co-design a game, along with faculty and students from the University of North Texas (UNT), a Hispanic-Serving Institution, to explore issues of ethics and diversity in data science. Students will be hands-on in exploring examples of educational games, brainstorming and providing ideas for games, creating prototypes, and playtesting. Some themes we may consider include data privacy, trust of algorithmic systems, predictive policing, fairness, and others. Our goal is to produce a working prototype of a game, playtest it, and study our own design processes to gain insight into how conflicts in norms and culture may change the learning process.
This will be a two-quarter directed research group with the goal of writing and submitting a paper to a top venue in June 2022. All group members will be offered the opportunity to be co-authors on the paper.
We are looking for a relatively small group of people who are each interested in between 2 and 5 credit hours of credit/no credit grade in HCDE 496/596 for Winter and Spring Quarters in 2022. Interested undergraduate and graduate students may apply. Graphic design experience and familiarity with a wide variety of games is recommended but not required for motivated students.
The group will meet virtually over Zoom to accommodate the UNT students, although we may meet a few times in person at UW before the UNT semester starts. Meetings will be on Thursdays at either 11:30-1, 12-1:30, or 12:30-2 depending on group availability.
Human Centered Natural Language Processing and Text Visualization
This research group will apply human-centered techniques in the fields of natural language processing (NLP) and visualization to study very large text corpora, with a specific focus on text visualization. We’re looking for students with experience in either (a) programming and analysis of large text datasets or (b) machine learning and data science. Data visualization or NLP experience is a plus but not required.
Aviation Safety Research:
A sub-section of the research group will focus on analyzing survey responses and creating various forms of data visualization to convey survey results. Experience with survey analysis, data visualization tools, and a working knowledge of the aviation industry is a plus, but not required.
Emotions and Relationship-Building in Online Fanfiction Communities
Led by HCDE PhD student Sourojit Ghosh, with guidance from Professor Cecilia Aragon
This research group will investigate the role played by shared or conflicting emotions in the process of relationship-building in online communities. We aim to explore that role through extensive qualitative coding of individual fanfiction reviews. This work will be the final quarter of an ongoing research project on this topic, utilizing subsets of a large dataset of fanfiction data collected by the Human-Centered Data Science Lab in previous years. Past explorations with this dataset have put forward the theory of distributed mentoring, a phenomenon where people from all over the world and all age groups collaboratively give and receive support through an informal yet substantive network of constructive advice. The goal for this DRG will be to finish our qualitative coding via a novel collaborative coding and visualization tool, and to contribute to a research paper to be submitted to CSCW this academic year.
Participants in this DRG will gain hands-on experience with large datasets, learning to qualitatively analyze each data point for its rich content while also looking at it in the larger context of the entire set.
Human Centered Natural Language Processing and Text Visualization
This research group will apply human-centered techniques to the field of natural language processing (NLP) to study very large text corpora, with an additional focus on text visualization. We’re looking for students with experience in either (a) programming and analysis of large text datasets or (b) machine learning and data science. No NLP experience is required as we will be reading seminal papers in the field and applying those techniques to a text dataset.
We plan to use a previously-collected dataset of over 61.5 billion words (the largest fiction dataset outside of the Google Books corpus) of stories, reviews, and associated metadata from fanfiction sites as a test dataset for human-centered NLP techniques.
Human Centered Natural Language Processing
This research group will apply human-centered techniques to the field of natural language processing (NLP) to study very large text corpora. We’re looking for students with experience in either (a) programming and analysis of large text datasets or (b) machine learning and data science. No NLP experience is required as we will be reading seminal papers in the field and applying those techniques to a text dataset.
We plan to use a previously-collected dataset of over 61.5 billion words (the largest fiction dataset outside of the Google Books corpus) of stories, reviews, and associated metadata from fanfiction sites as a test dataset for human-centered NLP techniques.