The article proposes a conceptual framework for studying the organization of time in educational ... more The article proposes a conceptual framework for studying the organization of time in educational games. A time-focused analysis can productively examine time frames and time work in a serious game, in order to understand its timescapes of learning, and its politics of time. Games may be designed to accommodate strategies of play of variable time intensity, to assist players' time work, to support dynamics of learning, to encourage knowledge of history and foresight, and to illustrate various economies of time.
Inkle's '80 Days' offers players the chance of an unusual experience of history. The game combine... more Inkle's '80 Days' offers players the chance of an unusual experience of history. The game combines a layer of historical events and characters with a layer of steampunk science-fiction, using the later as a magnifying glass to highlight minority perspectives and experiences. At the same time, 80 Days merges two views on the relation between biography and history: the player remains a witness, while non-player characters are deeply immersed in making and remaking histories. These dual structures make '80 Days' into a strong resource for discussing the interplay between history and biography, and appealing to history as a resource for empathy.
We study smoking-cessation apps in order to formulate a framework for ethical evaluation, analyzi... more We study smoking-cessation apps in order to formulate a framework for ethical evaluation, analyzing apps as 'medium', 'market', and 'genre'. We center on the value of user autonomy through truthfulness and self-understanding. Smoking-cessation apps usually communicate in an anonymous 'app voice', with little presence of professional or other identified voices. Because of the fast-and-frugal communication, truthfulness is problematic. Messages in the 'quantification' modules may be read as deceitfully accurate. The app voice frames smoking as a useless, damaging habit indicative of weakness of will, in a 'cold-turkey' frame of individual mind-over-body heroism. Thus apps contribute to a stigmatization of smokers and culpabilization of relapses. The potential to support user autonomy through diverse meaningful voices and personalized communication remains yet unused.
The ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI 2014, Alt.Chi, 2014
We analyze quantification in the open review process of Alt.Chi panels. We find that reviewers di... more We analyze quantification in the open review process of Alt.Chi panels. We find that reviewers differ systematically regarding their activity patterns. We distinguish 'critical', 'supportive', 'discerning' and 'keen' reviewers, with distinctive contributions for two resources of meaningful numeric evaluation: intersubjectivity and intra-personal commensurability. The acceptance decision is associated with the average paper grade and, to a lesser extent, with the number of paper reviews. We identify four categories of articles that reflect the article distribution of reviewer types.
We examine online sociality in Quora, a collaborative Q&A platform, through statistical analysis ... more We examine online sociality in Quora, a collaborative Q&A platform, through statistical analysis of 248 answers. Quora members interact through technology and with technology, creating different regimes of sociality: a regime of visibility, in which users and technology assemble the ranked list of answers; a regime of recognition, in which members rely on answers and authors' identity to acknowledge value; a regime of interaction, in which members comment on posted answers. We classify answers in three clusters: Sympa, Inspire and Casual. Answer types are related to the socio-technical creation of sociality regimes.
We analyze digital rhetoric in two computersupported collaborative settings of writing and learni... more We analyze digital rhetoric in two computersupported collaborative settings of writing and learning, focusing on major depression: Wikipedia and Quora. We examine the procedural rhetoric of access to and interaction with information, and the textual rhetoric of individual and aggregated entries. Through their different organization of authorship, publication and reading, the two settings create divergent accounts of depression. Key points of difference include: focus on symptoms and causes vs. experiences and advice, use of lists vs. metaphors and narratives, a/temporal structure, and personal and relational knowledge.
The 6th International Conference on Computer Supported Education - CSEDU 2014, 2014
We analyze in-depth five smoking cessation apps on Android OS, examining how they teach users to ... more We analyze in-depth five smoking cessation apps on Android OS, examining how they teach users to quit smoking and what they learn from users. Apps advise would-be ex-smokers how to perceive the world, how to deal with their emotions, and how to act on their bodies and environment. Still, they learn little from their users, and even less from the scientific literature on smoking cessation. We discuss the potential for improved customization of advice to users' profiles and we propose a simple inventory of online scientific resources as a starting point for developers looking to create better apps.
The 16th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction HCII'14, 2014
We examine the ways in which answers formulated in the Q&A community Quora are aggregated in a co... more We examine the ways in which answers formulated in the Q&A community Quora are aggregated in a collaborative, computer-mediated body of knowledge. Readers' experiences are shaped by the answer ranking algorithm, a central rhetorical device on Quora. Answer visibility on page is strongly dependent on the number of upvotes, but also on recency and author popularity. Upvotes depend to some extent on wordcount, followers, and use of visual representations, but not on answer's age. This indicates that readers engage with Quora as a body of stratified information, rather than pursuing unlimited diversity of perspectives: engagement seems to be limited to the top answers, which represent, for practical purposes, Quora's persuasive statements.
The 16th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction HCII'14, 2014
In this paper we analyze 26 smoking cessation applications on Android OS focusing on how they add... more In this paper we analyze 26 smoking cessation applications on Android OS focusing on how they address their implied users. We identify 'refreshing quantification' as a main method, which endorses a portrait of the users as myopic in risk perception, but heroic in their individual pursuit to reach the non-smoker identity. App-created relationships and identities give rise to a temporal order based on contemplating the past and anticipating the future. Users are guided towards an autonomy-centered identity project, which renders them accountable for success or failure in smoking cessation. Users' experience of smoking cessation is co-constructed in their interaction with the app-coach and with peers. Apps and peers offer diagnoses, advice, labels that populate the world in which the would-be ex-smokers pursue their project.
The 16th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction HCII'14, 2014
This paper examines current practices in motivating students to design accessible technologies, a... more This paper examines current practices in motivating students to design accessible technologies, and proposes an additional method to promote a long-term, steadfast commitment to accessibility. We examine recent reports of teaching accessibility for blind users to sighted students, and we find three types of motivational devices: 1) a 'web of arguments' as to morality, legality, and usefulness, 2) empathy, and 3) framing accessibility through mainstreaming. We observe that the challenge of interactional malaise between sighted and blind people is often neglected, and we propose an 'Interaction Sandbox' to overcome it. We also put forward an additional way of framing accessible design, in order to position it as a work of autonomy, mastery, and purpose: the 'Quest' metaphor. Accessible design is thus introduced as the pursuit of a daring goal against widespread adversity, through mastery, in the company of powerful characters. The Quest is set in motion by bringing students to appreciate the technical wizardry of accessible design, its aesthetics, and the heroism of blind people as skilled navigators of a dangerous world.
The 6th International Conference on Computer Supported Education - CSEDU 2014, 2014
We analyze current approaches in motivating students to pursue accessibility, with a focus on bli... more We analyze current approaches in motivating students to pursue accessibility, with a focus on blind users, by examining scientific reports of courses in the computer science and engineering curriculum. We identify three main motivational resorts: a 'web of arguments', referring to issues of morality, legality, and interest; the practice of mainstreaming, which normalizes accessibility, and empathy. We argue that an aesthetic frame could contribute to a forceful, persistent motivation, and we propose an aesthetic motivational repertoire, on three dimensions: aesthetic value of technological tools, of engineers' own work, and of their direct and indirect relationships with blind persons. We present arguments, practices, and online resources to support teachers that introduce accessibility for blind users to sighted students.
Revista de Cercetare și Intervenție Socială 44(1): 116-131
We estimate the influence of daily smoking frequency on behaviors and beliefs that affect self an... more We estimate the influence of daily smoking frequency on behaviors and beliefs that affect self and others' exposure to tobacco smoke: smoking at home and in the car, passive smoking in public establishments and at the workplace, and beliefs about passive smoking risks, through a secondary analysis of Eurobarometer 77.1 / 2012 and 72.3 / 2009 surveys on European Union (EU27) population. We find that the number of daily cigarettes is a powerful predictor of smoking at home and in the car. This finding also holds for smokers that live with children aged 10 and younger in the house. Daily smoking frequency is a strong predictor of respondents' exposure to tobacco smoke in eating and drinking establishments and at the workplace. By aggregating datasets, we identify a significant decline of exposure to passive smoking from 2009 to 2012. Contrary to expectations, light smokers and heavy smokers express, on average, similar opinions concerning health risks of tobacco smoke for nonsmokers. This concurrence indicates that defensive information processing concerning tobacco smoke does not change with reduced smoking. Quitting makes a difference: former smokers are significantly more likely to acknowledge serious health risks than current smokers. Developers of selftracking applications for smokers could contribute to reduced exposure to tobacco smoke of users and those in their proximity, such as children, by stimulating awareness to the social circumstances of smoking and exposure to smoke, and by encouraging users to monitor smoking at home and in the car.
This paper presents an innovative method for constituting a community of learners through an onli... more This paper presents an innovative method for constituting a community of learners through an online course platform. We examine the role of shared routines in stabilizing patterns of interaction, defining specific skills and required knowledge, consolidating communication, and establishing reputations. While predictability is a core resource for the construction of a productive online community of learners, unpredictability may also be used to harness a special form of continuous, intense involvement. For example, random rewards are often employed as incentives in gamified environments. A flow of transient, ephemeral information may stimulate engagement for fear of 'missing out', while a structured, predictable archiving system allows users to postpone accessing the information until it is urgently required. On these theoretical considerations, we designed the P.R.Frenzy_Feed platform that combines predictable and unpredictable events to engage users in a community of learning based on shared routines. P.R.Frenzy_Feed is designed as a forum of discussion for instructors and final-year students enrolled in an advanced computer networking course at University Politehnica of Bucharest. Unlike well-accustomed online forums of discussions, P.R.Frenzy_Feed incorporates the principle of 'chaos by design': it is not separated on topic-specific threads but, instead, it is organized (or rather dis-organized) as a single, unified flow of information on all possible topics, by all possible contributors. News about laboratories, exercises, and learning materials come to be interpolated with conversations about favorite horror movies, IT trivia, or other course-unrelated subjects. In this environment students have to follow attentively and dig after relevant content to keep pace with course requirements. To facilitate such an intense, regular engagement, we introduced a highly predictable Question of the Night mini-competition, in which students answer a riddle posted on the platform at midnight. Ultimately, we tried to create routines of interaction, learning, and informal conversation to constitute the social system of a community of learners. The case-study relies on the intermediary and final evaluations of students' and instructors' experience with P.R.Frenzy_Feed, based on semi-structured interviews. Results indicate that a combination of predictability and chaos can be an effective resource to stimulate community building. An important challenge resides in effectively maintaining the promised uniformity in the predictable components, in order to avoid user disengagement.
Design, User Experience, and Usability. Health, Learning, Playing, Cultural, and Cross-Cultural User Experience Lecture Notes in Computer Science Volume 8013, 2013, pp 577-586
We analyze the ‘Revision Fever’ gamification exercise and the challenges of adjusting the logic o... more We analyze the ‘Revision Fever’ gamification exercise and the challenges of adjusting the logic of gameplay to the logic of the non-game activity. We rely on ‘instrumental genesis’ theory (Béguin & Rabardel, 2000) and a conceptualization of the ‘magic circle’ of gameplay (Stenros, 2012) to highlight points of divergence and possibilities of adjustment on two dimensions: the gamification artifact, including the rules of the game layer and the organization of the arena of play, and players’ activity schemes, especially their play strategies and their engagement with the game layer. The work of adjustment is collective and distributed across roles, participants, and time. Gamification involves the design and continuous enactment of a ‘magic circle’ that is transparent towards the associated non-game activity.
HCI International 2013 - Posters’ Extended Abstracts Communications in Computer and Information Science Volume 374, 2013, pp 84-88
We discuss digital badges in education, focusing on two functions of badge architectures: mapping... more We discuss digital badges in education, focusing on two functions of badge architectures: mapping a learning system and offering a vocabulary to present one’s achievements. We have designed, implemented and evaluated two badge architectures; our research findings support the conclusion that students see these medals less as extrinsic motivations than as signposts that point out relevant learning targets. Also, because trainers and students define badges mainly as fun, locally relevant prizes, there is little concern for how they can be used to communicate merits outside the learning community. Badge architectures can be designed to support local or public reputations; if public visibility is desired, the system should assist holders’ work of claiming merit.
10th International Conference on Computer Supported Collaborative Learning CSCL 2013
In this paper we present and evaluate the serious game World of Operating Systems (WoUSO), design... more In this paper we present and evaluate the serious game World of Operating Systems (WoUSO), designed to scaffold an emerging technical community of students. WoUSO is a voluntary, semester-long browser game that embeds quizzes and riddles in multiple forms of player interaction. Game evaluation indicates that WoUSO creates shared experiences in which classroom learning and technical skills become resources for fun and sociability. Competition and player interaction are two main motivational engines of the game; they need to be judiciously calibrated in order to reduce incentives for rule bending, to accommodate multiple styles of play, and to diversify resources for self-presentation and positive reputations.
10th International Conference on Computer Supported Collaborative Learning CSCL 2013
We discuss the challenges of applying a game design frame on a learning activity, through a case ... more We discuss the challenges of applying a game design frame on a learning activity, through a case study of a gamified collaborative review exercise. We distinguish problems of gameplay from problems of divergence between game and non-game logics. Using Béguin & Rabardel's theory of instrumental genesis we observe how the gamification instrument shapes the review activity, in the process of continuously adapting artifacts and users' activity schemes. We identify locally emergent solutions to the divergence issue: players resort to half-engagement with the game and tailor gameplay strategies, selectively ignoring, observing or bending rules such as to manage the relative priorities of game and non-game objectives. In our case study gamification is more than an engine for fun: it facilitates learning by structuring the collaborative activity in memorable events with specific tempo, attention focus, and communication style. Constant adjustment enriches learning and becomes part of the game.
The 8th Iberian Conference on Information Systems and Technologies CISTI 2013
We examine patterns of evaluation on the open peer review forum of the AltCHI panel of the ACM SI... more We examine patterns of evaluation on the open peer review forum of the AltCHI panel of the ACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2012-2013. By analyzing a dataset including all available reviews posted on the AltCHI online platforms, we find that author reviewers are more critical than external commentators, and later submission reviews are more favorable than earlier ones. We find substantial inter-reviewer agreement, partly explainable through persuasive convergence and anchoring effects. Final article acceptance through juried selection is strongly correlated with the average grade in open review, while the number of article reviews is less consequential for selection. The communication design of AltCHI open review balances several conflicting participation incentives, in order to support juried selection for atypical and potentially controversial papers.
The 8th Iberian Conference on Information Systems and Technologies CISTI 2013
We examine the gamification debate of recent years and we propose an alternative, heuristic defin... more We examine the gamification debate of recent years and we propose an alternative, heuristic definition for gamification in learning situations. After considering several critiques of the gamification concept, we privilege in our definition 'interaction' over 'motivation', 'simple gameplay' over 'game mechanics', and we highlight the diverse and changing behaviors of user/players. We re-define gamification in learning contexts as 'simple gameplay to support productive interaction for expected types of learners and instructors'. We argue that this definition offers a lowest common denominator to inform gamification in education.
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HCI by Razvan Rughinis