Rob Comber
Rob Comber is an interdisciplinary researcher working in the field of Human-Computer Interaction drawing together concerns for social and environmental sustainability in the processes of technology design and use. Within the context of HCI, his research is primarily on social and collective uses of technology, researching topics including democracy, social justice, environmental sustainability, and food. Over the past few years, this has taken shape through the application of critical theory in various contexts, including the implications of regulation on environmental stewardship and innovation, theories of place-making as community-building and in response to alienation in urban settings, the emotional work of peacebuilding, and a concern for the relational aspects of our engagement with nature, energy systems, and environmental sustainability. Reflecting this concern for the relational aspects of our engagements, he has started to question the foundational thinking on what it means to interact with a digital system and how that might be different from our interactions with each other and with our environments. What does it mean we have to design, not for convenience, fun, or consumption, but for a constraints-based approach to interaction design? https://twitter.com/robcomberKathrin Gerling
Kathrin Gerling is Professor of Human-Computer Interaction and Accessibility at the Institute for Anthropomatics und Robotics (IAR) within the Department of Informatics at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), and head of the research group Human-Computer Interaction and Accessibility. Previously, she was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at KU Leuven, Belgium (2017-2022) and a Lecturer at the University of Lincoln, UK (2014-2017). In 2014, she received a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Saskatchewan, Canada. Her research in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) explores interactive systems and their potential to provide enriching experiences. From a technical perspective, the research focus lies on systems that are closely intertwined with users’ bodies, ranging from sensor-based wearable systems and assistive technology to immersive experiences such as digital games and virtual reality. Central to the research of her group is the question how interactive technology can be designed in a way that supports human self-determination, and how we can achieve experiential accessibility – accessibility that strives for equitable experiences, and seeks to provide engaging user experiences for all of us. Excellence of her work and that of her team has been recognized through multiple awards, including Best Paper Awards at the leading venue in HCI, the ACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, and an ERC Starting Grant. She is a member of the steering committee of CHI PLAY, serves on the editorial board of PACM HCI, and is part of the SIGCHI executive committee as AC for Hybrid.Richard Landers
Richard N. Landers, Ph.D., is the John P. Campbell Distinguished Professor of Industrial-Organizational Psychology at the University of Minnesota. He is Principal Investigator for TNTLAB (Testing New Technologies in Learning, Assessment and Behavior), where his research concerns the use of innovative technologies like games, gamification, machine learning, artificial intelligence, and virtual reality, to improve psychometric assessment, employee selection, adult learning, and research methods. He is a Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, American Psychological Association, and Association for Psychological Science. His work appears primarily in psychology journals, such as American Psychologist, Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Business and Psychology, Industrial and Organizational Psychology Perspectives, and Psychological Methods, and in interdisciplinary human-computer interaction outlets, including Computers in Human Behavior, International Journal of Human-Computer Studies and Simulation & Gaming. He currently serves as associate editor for the International Journal of Selection and Assessment and is on the editorial board of Journal of Business and Psychology and Personnel Assessment and Decisions. He is author of two textbooks (one statistics and one research methods) and has developed two edited scholarly volumes: Social Media in Employee Selection and the Cambridge Handbook of Technology and Employee Behavior. Dr. Landers maintains connections with industry, the media, and practitioners. He is featured frequently in the popular press, such as Forbes, Business Insider, and Popular Science, and healso consults with industry as president of Landers Workforce Science LLC (https://landers.tech), primarily by auditing employee hiring systems incorporating artificial intelligence and machine learning.