Bio: My work explores the potential of design and digital technologies, jewellery and the act of making to support sense of self across a range of complex human contexts. I’m co-founder and co-editor of the Journal of Jewellery Research with Dr Roberta Bernabei and co-founder of the Research Through Design conference series with Prof Joyce Yee.
At Northumbria, I am based in the School of Design’s CoCreate group, where I work with a brilliant group of academics, post-doctoral and doctoral researchers all exploring the intersection of design, technology and participation in a range of human contexts. I’m currently principal investigator on the Enabling Ongoingness research project funded by the EPSRC, Co-Investigator on the EPSRC Centre for Digital Citizens, Co-Investigator on the REAPPEAR project funded by PETRAS via the EPSRC and Co-Investigator on the EU Marie Curie funded OpenDoTT project. You can find out more about my work from my personal website.
I am Professor of Digital Living in the School of Computer and Information Science. I study Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and the design of interactive computational technologies. I'm particularly interested in design research methods and the ways in which technology design can be centred on rich understanding of user experiences, cultures and contexts.
I have previously held positions as Senior Lecturer of Experience-Centred Design and then Reader in Cultural Computing at Newcastle University, Lecturer in Human-Computer Interaction in the Mixed Reality Lab and School of Computer Science at the University of Nottingham, and as a post-doc in the Socio-Digital Systems group at Microsoft Research Cambridge. My background is in Psychology (BSc) and Ergonomics (MSc) with a PhD in Computer Science. Over the years my work has been heavily influenced by the sociologists, philosophers and designers that I've collaborated with and consequently I take a design-led, social science orientation to understanding human experience and its application to the design of digital technologies. Accordingly, and although trained as an experimental scientist, my research is increasingly based on qualitative methods and design-research practices.
