H-star visitors

Consistent with our belief that many of the major problems we focus on can be solved only by cross-disciplinary research on an international scale, H-STAR welcomes visiting researchers from universities and research laboratories all over the world.

While some visitors come on an individual basis, our experience has been that visits are generally more productive when made as part of an institutional H-STAR partnership. Current institutional partners are the Finnish university system, through Tekes, the Danish university system, through DASTI, and the Swedish university system, through VINNOVA. See the H-STAR partnerships page for more details.

2009-10 Visitors

Anu Sivunen, Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland. June 2009 - August 2010. Hosted by Byron Reeves, H-STAR. My research project focuses on the organizational uses of virtual worlds for communication and collaboration. Specifically, I am interested in the social interaction and group identity of innovative, geographically dispersed teams collaborating in these environments. The research questions are: 1) What are the specific features of virtual worlds that are related to team communication and team dynamics, such as to the creation of a shared group identity and 2) how team members construct their social identities when collaborating via avatars in these 3D environments. While staying at Stanford, I will work with empirical data collected from a geographically dispersed group collaborating in Second Life.		Ana Alacovska, Department of Intercultural Communication and Management, Copenhagen Business School, Denmark. May 2009 - August 2009. Working with Fred Turner, Dept of Communication. My project "Travel Guidebooks: From Multimodal Discourses to Multimedia Mobile Devices" investigates the media convergence between corporate publishing houses and new interactive media, to understand how digitised virtual/fictional worlds enact users via shared digital media and participatory social networks and to learn how the use/co-creation of the digital travel content influences individual communication, interaction and travel experience. The research aims to explore the interplay between the fictionality of the paper multimodal genre, the virtuality and mobility of digital multimedia content and the physicality of the travel destination the guide may be taken to represent.
Niina Nurmi, Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland. April 2008 - April 2010. Working with Pamela Hinds, Dept of Management Science and Engineering. My research is focused on virtual and mobile knowledge work. My main research question is: What are the specific job demands, stressors and job resources that contribute to the well-being of distributed team members? I use qualitative approach in analyzing interview data from nine globally distributed industrial teams to identify and model the demands, hindrances and enablers of well-being and leadership in virtual and mobile knowledge work. In this research, I apply psychological, organizational, and information technology perspectives.		Carsten Bergenholtz, Department of Management, School of Business, University of Aarhus, Denmark. September 2009 - December 2009. Working with Karen Cook, Dept of Sociology. My research focuses on interorganizational social networks and how to identify and explore weak ties in the biotechnological field. The focal case company, Unisense, is an innovative Danish biotech SME that provides microsensors for a wide range of applications. Since highly specialized competencies are costly in the bio-medical field, an open network approach is emphasized in order to get access to relevant knowledge on markets and products. But how can a SME with limited resources explore 3000 contacts? And to what degree can this be achieved in the virtual world of IT, or is it necessary to embed the interaction in real life meetings?
Tatiana Bazzichelli, Department of Information and Media Studies, Aarhus University, Denmark. August 2009 - December 2009. Working with Jeffrey Schnapp, Stanford Humanities Lab. Networking 2.0: An Aesthetic, Technological and Social Critique of Collective Art. This research proposes to analyze the roots of artistic practices and social intervention based on both analog and digital networked art, showing that the current artistic challenge of the Web 2.0 platforms lies in the invention of new courses of action and new contents developed by grassroots communities. The aim is to investigate how networking practices are able to change the model of production of Internet contents and artistic creations, connecting the development of hacker ethics with the creation of Web 2.0 social networking platforms. A thread that connects networked art such as mail art, culture jamming and hacker art with Web 2.0 social practices.		Michael Carl, Copenhagen Business School, Frederiksberg, Denmark. September 2009 - December 2009. Working with Martin Kay, Dept of Linguistics. My current research interest focuses on process-oriented translation, specifically the elaboration, formalization and empirical validation of cognitively plausible models for human translation processes, using keyboard logging and eye-tracking technologies, so-called User Activity Data (UAD). I am working on the design and implementation of a query language for UAD to correlate human activity patterns with properties of the source and target texts. The goal is to achieve a better understanding of the basic processing concepts that underlie and guide human translation behavior, and to prepare ground for advanced human interaction with machine-translation systems.
Chigusa Kita, Faculty of Informatics, Kansai University, Japan. September 2009 - August 2010. Working with Terry Winograd, Dept of Computer Science. I was originally trained as a historian, and one of my research topics has been the process of institutionalization of computer science, especially the history of the Human-Computer Interaction field. During my stay in Stanford, I will examine the present status of the Human-Computer Interaction field from a Science and Technology Studies point of view, and the way in which the historical knowledge of the field can help to educate young engineers. I am also interested in how humanities knowledge can help to shape technological ideas into a socially embedded system in designing interaction between a tool and human society.		Ole Broberg, Dept of Management Engineering, Technical University of Denmark, Denmark September 2009 - December 2009. Working with Larry Leifer, Center for Design Research My research focuses on design processes that develop new technologies in workplaces. Engineering design often lead to technology 'scripts' that are ineffective in supporting the work practices, or cause safety and health problems. To bridge the gap between scripts and user adoption requires rethinking the design process. An innovative workplace is a strategic element of the organization in which the interdependency between space, organization, technology, culture, and finance are in a dynamic relationship. The research seeks to develop a conceptual framework to study ways to organize collaborative design processes in which both user knowledge and safety and health knowledge are represented.
Heli Ruokamo, Center for Media Pedagogy, Univ of Lapland, Finland. November 2009 - May 2010. Working with Roy Pea, School of Education. My project focuses on developing pedagogical models for both virtual and simulation-based, playful learning environments. We have two collaborative research projects currently underway between Stanford and the University of Lapland, involving the development of pedagogical models for virtual and simulation-based learning environments for health and welfare. We conduct research in simulation centers in Finland and the US to test and further develop the models. Additionally, we have been developing pedagogical models for playful learning environments to meet the educational challenges of the future. We have tested the models by conducting international teaching experiments in playful learning environments enriched by technological tools.		Christa Amhoj, Dept of Learning, Aarhus University, Denmark December 2009 - March 2010. Working with Dan McFarland, School of Education I examine the use of fantasy travels as a medium for educational management in both the Danish Public School system and in other educational institutions. A central concern is how fantasy is used to encourage 'concrete educational identities' to zig zag themselves between fictive forms of subjectivity (e.g. cartoon characters and wizards), discursive subject positions (e.g. the silent girls, the wild boys) and formal roles (e.g. employee, teacher). My research aims to explore the consequences for both the educational identities and management of the transpositions between what we recognise as the real educational organisation, the discursive constructed context, and the fictive/virtual space.

2008-09 Visitors

Katarina Segerstahl, Dept of Information Processing Science, University of Oulu, Finland. August 2008 - July 2009. Working with Terry Winograd, Dept of Computer Science. My research focuses on how to support coherent user experiences in heterogeneous system settings. I am interested in 1) understanding how user experiences are formed in the context of Extended Information Services (EIS) - services that are systemically extended across multiple platforms and 2) how distinct system characteristics influence coherent user experiences in these environments. My previous experience as an interaction designer in sports technology industry sheds additional practitioner insight into my work. With my qualitative, cross-disciplinary research I wish to contribute practical in-depth knowledge that can be used in the design of more user-friendly pervasive IT.		Jeppe Bundsgaard, School of Education, University of Aarhus, Denmark. August 2008 - November 2008. Working with John Willinsky, School of Education. My ongoing project is called Building Professional Communities of Practice in School: Practice Scaffolding Interactive Platforms (PracSIP). A PracSIP is an Internet platform which makes students able to simulate (parts of) the community of practice of a professional setting, and thereby supports their development of educationally important competencies. In collaboration with the Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet I have developed a PracSIP called The Editorial Office which supports students in building a journalistic community of practice. While staying at Stanford, I will work with empirical data from Danish classes that have worked with The Editorial Office.
Niina Nurmi, Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland. April 2008 - April 2010. Working with Pamela Hinds, Dept of Management Science and Engineering. My research is focused on virtual and mobile knowledge work. My main research question is: What are the specific job demands, stressors and job resources that contribute to the well-being of distributed team members? I use qualitative approach in analyzing interview data from nine globally distributed industrial teams to identify and model the demands, hindrances and enablers of well-being and leadership in virtual and mobile knowledge work. In this research, I apply psychological, organizational, and information technology perspectives.		Harri Oinas-Kukkonen, Dept of Information Processing Science, University of Oulu, Finland. August 2008 - July 2009. Working with Terry Winograd, Dept of Computer Science. Social media and Web2.0 have changed the way people think and use the Internet. They also seem to be key drivers for deeper integration of the Internet and mobile applications. Key research issues in my project include Web2.0 platform, applications, and features, and the risks they pose (for both individuals and organizations). Special emphasis will be given to understanding the role of social networks and persuasion in this context. Overall, the goal of this project is to develop sound and safe design principles for the next generation of Web-based and mobile applications.
Tanja Kotro, National Consumer Research Centre, Kaikukatu, Finland. September 2008 - May 2009. Hosted by Byron Reeves, H-STAR. I study organizational knowing related to decision making and anticipating and creating the future, especially the future consumer needs. My previous work focused on intuitive and experience based knowing as an important resource for product development and user involvement in sports technology. My current research covers areas of knowledge management, organizational studies, social aspects of creativity and new tools and models for social innovativeness. I analyze practices and references of knowing within a business context and the development of tools and practices to enhance organizational knowledge creation and creativity together with user orientation.		Stephen Fox, Senior Research Scientist, VTT, Finland. September 2008 - December 2008. Working with Roy Pea, SCIL. Shortages of skilled operatives, and of skill instructors, are reported in many manual occupations throughout the world. Several technologies have the potential to enable the formulation and communication of skill knowledge - without human skill instructors. My study investigates the relative potential of different technologies, such as virtual reality and augmented reality. Further, my study investigates the relevance to instruction by these technologies of establish techniques which are used during the formulation and communication of skill knowledge by human instructors.
Kristian Torning, Danfoss A/S, Nordborg and School of Education, Aarhus University, Denmark. October 2008 - December 2008. Hosted by Byron Reeves, H-STAR. I am researching how we can use rhetorical communication theory when designing interactive computer systems and whether it might allow us to address end-user motivation directly. My case is corporate knowledge management systems for innovation. I hope to contribute with a different understanding of the human-to-human computer mediated relationship in a corporate setting. At Stanford I will be studying persuasive technology at the Persuasive Technology Lab and trying to establish how this field might be valuable in ensuring end-user contributions in corporate systems.		Louise Moller Nielsen, Dept of Architecture and Design, Aalberg University, Denmark. September 2008 - March 2009. Working with Larry Leifer, Center for Design Research. The focus of my research is Strategic Design, which is a combination of business, design and social science. It involves multidisciplinary teams working with complex and unframed problems. Strategic Design is a relatively new area in both practice and research. Nevertheless it approaches some of the key questions in relation to our everyday lives. For example: What can hospitals do to improve children's experience during hospitalization? or What will television be used for in the future? The research is conducted as a processual research and the purpose is to identify some of the driving mechanisms in the Strategic Design process.
Rene Chester Goduscheit, Center for Industrial Production, Aalborg University, Denmark. September 2008 - December 2008. Working with Karen Cook, Dept of Sociology. My research is aimed at innovation in inter-organizational networks with specific focus on the initial phases of the network (how do companies identify and involve other companies in an inter-organizational network?). The theoretical framework is Social Network Analysis. The project with which I will be working during my visiting scholarship at H-STAR is an inter-organizational network, the Intelligent Utility network (www.intelligentutility.dk), which is seeking to develop new business models, services and products on the basis of the current implementation of smart meters in Danish private households.		Shuhua Liu, Academy Research Fellow, Academy of Finland, and IT Dept, Abo Akademi University, Finland. June, 2008 - July, 2009. Host: Thomas Wasow, Dept of Linguistics. My current research focuses on the business intelligence and medical/nursing informatics applications of text summarization and information extraction systems. The goal is to develop useful summarization and IE applications and to better understand the possibilities and challenges in developing and using these applications, while in the process to further improve the underlying methods and techniques. I am especially interested in trends and network discovery and following-up through the analysis and summarization of economic and business reports and news, daily nursing narratives, and AML Suspicious Activity Reports.
Vilma Luoma-aho, Dept of History & Ethnology, University of Jyvaskyla, Finland. July 2008 - July 2009, Visiting Researcher, Innovation Journalism Program. Hosted by Stig Hagstrom, SCIL. My research project "mediated reputation" approaches reputation formation of innovations through thematic interviews of key people (journalists, VCs, Analysts and PR-practitioners) in the innovation industry in Silicon Valley and aims at constructing a model for the formation of media reputation of innovations. The project focuses on media reputation, as it is the journalists' impressions that most shape how the innovation is presented in the media and how the stakeholders in the end perceive the innovation. The project asks (1) What sources and clues do journalists combine to form their impression of an innovation? and (2) What role, if any, does media reputation have in the overall reputation of the innovation?		Niels Einar Veirum, Dept of Architecture & Design, Aalborg University, Denmark. November, 2008. Host: Roy Pea, SCIL. My current research looks at Transformation Design and User Driven Innovation for the Experience Economy. Despite the suggestion of business hype in this description, there is a very real need to make "freemium" business models sustainable at a local scale. My main focus right now is on historical adventure games and mobile technology in a number of projects in cooperation with Danish museums using narrative concepts linking historical information, museum objects and specific geographic locations. Young learners are engaged in production of quality content that can be disseminated via mobile internet and web 2.0 learning communities.
Camilla Mordhorst, Medical Museion, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. July 2008 - December 2008, Working with Russell Berman, Dept of Comparative Literature. During my stay I would like to deepen my studies of how the new biomedical material and visual world can inspire new ways of curatorial and display practices in museums. Biomedical objects differ from the kind of artefacts that we normally associate with medical history collections and museum exhibitions. This has mainly to do with the molecular, digital and hybrid structure of biomedical research and practice. How to overcome this communicative gap is in the focus of my research.		Kristian Kiili, Advanced Multimedia Center, Tampere University of Technology, Pori, Finland. January 2009 - June 2009. Host: Roy Pea, H-STAR. My research at H-STAR focuses on mobile social video applications. I am involved with a project that is developing an application that is used as a test-bed in our empirical studies. During my visit to Stanford I will conduct case studies in the context of learning and user-centered game design. I seek to explore the potential of mobile social media in these areas. Especially, I am interested in novel ways to apply tagged video content. Furthermore, the aim is to develop sound design principles of mobile social applications.
Anu Sivunen, Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland. June 2009 - August 2010. Hosted by Byron Reeves, H-STAR. My research project focuses on the organizational uses of virtual worlds for communication and collaboration. Specifically, I am interested in the social interaction and group identity of innovative, geographically dispersed teams collaborating in these environments. The research questions are: 1) What are the specific features of virtual worlds that are related to team communication and team dynamics, such as to the creation of a shared group identity and 2) how team members construct their social identities when collaborating via avatars in these 3D environments. While staying at Stanford, I will work with empirical data collected from a geographically dispersed group collaborating in Second Life.		Ying Yan, Technical University of Denmark. February 2009 - June 2009. Working with Leonid Kazovsky, Dept of Electrical Engineering. My research focuses on the design of architectures and resource management frameworks for integrated optical wireless networks. I address the challenges of integrating optical and wireless network technologies and building future access networks to provide a broadband and ubiquitous last-mile connection. My project investigates innovative architectural and transmission solutions based on the newest physical layer achievements and adequate management and control algorithms. The project pursues experimental validations of the architectural and transmission solutions by creating a versatile development and complex test environment.