Course Syllabus

The syllabus is meant to serve as an outline and guide for this course. Please note that the syllabus and course schedule may be modified with reasonable notice in order to accommodate the needs of the class. 

This course is based heavily on prior courses taught by Tamara Denning with incorporated materials from others, noted in slides and assignments where they appear.

Course Details

Instructors: Professor Kate Isaacs, Added 08-22: Warnock Engineering Building (WEB) 4660

TA: Josh Dawson

Office Hours: By Appointment 

Meetings: Mondays and Wednesdays, 3-4:20PM

Location: Warnock Engineering Building (WEB) L110

Land Acknowledgement: We acknowledge that this land, which is named for the Ute Tribe, is the traditional and ancestral homeland of the Shoshone, Paiute, Goshute, and Ute Tribes. The University of Utah recognizes and respects the enduring relationship that exists between many Indigenous Peoples and their traditional homelands. We respect the sovereign relationship between tribes, states, and the federal government, and we affirm the University of Utah’s commitment to a partnership with Native Nations and Urban Indian communities through research, education, and community outreach activities.

Quick Links:

 

Overview

This course provides an introduction to Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) / Human-Centered Computing (HCC) research. The course is primarily based on a combination of:

  • Reading research papers 
  • Discussion
  • Multiple small individual projects and assignments
  • A large, overarching group project divided into (group) sub-assignments
  • Lectures

In general we will be seeking to gain an increased understanding of HCI research contributions, methods, and focus areas. The purpose of this course is to provide a combination of practical and theoretical knowledge.

While many of the methods we will be working with in the course are applicable to both industry and academic research (e.g., think-alouds, heuristic evaluation, interviews), the focus and framing of this course is on academic research. This course is not about teaching a concrete set of steps that you can follow without thinking to give you a perfect user interface every time. Instead, this course is about a hands-on introduction to how to go about finding answers that may come up in user interface design or HCI/HCC research.

 

Course Learning Objectives

Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:

  • Comprehend, analyze, and contextualize academic publications from human-centered computing.
  • Discuss strengths and limitations of a variety of methods that can be utilized for user research and their suitability for a given context.
  • Apply qualitative methods to conduct user research that involve interaction with human participants.
  • Constructively critique the execution of a method as applied to user research.
  • Starting from creating research questions, iteratively refine the application of a research method to a specific research question.
  • Communicate the process and results of research to other researchers.

 

Required Course Materials

Textbook: There is no required textbook for this course. Required readings are posted on the course Canvas web-site.

In-Class: Please bring a writing implement to class. Some classes may benefit from your bringing a laptop or tablet. You will be informed in advance for those classes.

 

Notice of Objectionable Materials

This course contains a brief discussion and an assignment regarding the history of human subjects experiments, including medical experiments, which may be disturbing. 

This course will use real world examples of websites, apps, and other digital content, some of which is brought into the course by other students. Though the focus is on the design and functionality, the subject matter of this content could be mature or political in nature.

This course may discuss human perceptive systems such as vision, touch, and hearing. It is possible a student may discover during class facets of their personal systems they were previously unaware of, such as color-vision deficiency.

Students are not automatically excused from interacting with the described materials, but they are encouraged to speak with the instructor to voice concerns and to provide feedback.

 

Attendance and Class Behavior

Attendance and participation in course discussions is required and is factored into the course grading. Canvas is set to ignore the 3 lowest attendance grades (i.e., those 3 missed classes will have no effect on your grade). The purpose of this scheme is to provide a buffer for illness or other emergencies during the semester. If you have an emergency spanning longer than three classes, please discuss with the instructor.

Paragraph added 2022-09-27: Late entry or early exit to the class will be factored into attendance going forward.

We have several methods of recording attendance in this class. Attempts to circumvent accurate attendance reporting and/or lying about attendance is considered an academic integrity infraction. See the academic integrity section. 

All class members including students are expected to treat others in an inclusive manner. We do not tolerate exclusionary or disrespectful behavior, including gatekeeping, dog whistles, or other indirect forms of disparagement on the basis of identity or area of study. Exclusionary behavior commits harm on the community and bolsters the well-being and academic performance of some at the cost of others. Exclusionary behavior will be considered a course policy academic integrity infraction.

Examples:

  • Gatekeeping: "You don't know virtual memory [or other piece of knowledge]??"
  • Gatekeeping: "Machine learning [or other area] isn't real computer science."
  • Dog Whistles: "[Person]'s not qualified to speak on computer science." or "This is just not how computing is done in the real world." (where [Person]'s identity is from a group more likely to be questioned on their qualifications and legitimacy)
  • Gatekeeping/Dog Whistle: "[Person]'s work could have been a blog post. It didn't deserve to be published."

 

Grading

The grading breakdown in this course is as follows:

  • Participation
    • Attendance/Discussion (15%)
    • Pre-class turn-ins (15%)
  • Individual Project Assignments
    • CITI Training / Ethics Exercise (3%)
    • Think Aloud (requires participants) (10%)
    • Heuristic Evaluation (7%)
  • Group Project Assignments
    • Literature Review (10%)
    • Interviews / Interview Transcription (requires participants) (15%)
    • Crowdsourcing Project (10%)
    • Project Presentation (5%)
    • Final Report (10%)

There is no final exam.

We will attempt to communicate expectations and feedback throughout the course, but it is your responsibility to communicate with us if you would like guidance in this regard.

If you believe something was graded incorrectly, please make a private post to instructors on Piazza within one week of receiving the grade. Please explain specifically what part you believe was graded incorrectly and in what way it was graded incorrectly and we will review it.

 

Late Policy

  • Participation assignments (e.g., attendance and reading turn-ins) will not be accepted late.
    • Reminder: Canvas is set to ignore the 3 lowest attendance grades and the 3 lowest reading turn-in grades (i.e., those 3 missed classes will have no effect on your grade, those 3 missed turn-ins will have no effect on your grade).
  • Other assignments, unless noted otherwise, will have 10% of the total possible points deducted for each day they are late.
    • Additionally, these may be graded more slowly than assignments graded on-time as we cannot predict/schedule for grading late assignments.

 

Assignment & Project Overview

You will have something due before each class meeting (typically reading and pre-class turn-ins) as well as larger assignments due approximately weekly. These assignments are described below.

Reading and Pre-Class Turn-ins (individual): The purpose of these turn-ins are to prepare you for in-class discussion and activities, give you practice for larger assignments, and help you prepare for group project activities.

CITI Training (individual): The purpose of this assignment is to learn about ethical treatment of human subjects by completing the CITI (Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative) Social / Behavioral Research training or a refresher exercise for those who have already completed it. The training contains fundamental information regarding the ethical treatment of human subjects and makes you eligible to participate in (IRB-approved) Social / Behavioral research at the University of Utah.

Think-Aloud Protocol (individual, requires participants): The purpose of this assignment is to get hands-on experience with the think-aloud protocol which is a useful method for uncovering (particularly first-time) interaction issues with systems. You must conduct some think-aloud sessions and complete a writeup to document your findings and reflect on the process.

Heuristic Evaluation (individual): Heuristic evaluation is a method for individuals to use a set of design principles (heuristics) in order to identify problems (or successes) in a user interface or interaction. You must conduct a heuristic evaluation and complete a writeup to document your findings and reflect on the process.

Literature Review (group): The purpose of this assignment is to get hands-on experience with conducting a literature review of related work. Your group must complete a writeup after you as a group find, review, summarize, and analyze the relevance of research papers related to their topic and reflect on the process.

Conducting Interviews (group, requires participants): The purpose of this assignment is to get hands-on experience with writing interview questions, conducting interviews, and transcribing interviews. Your group will write interview questions and each group member must conduct a few interviews. Your group will turn in a writeup reflecting on the process of conducting interviews. Additionally, you will turn in a partial interview transcript of one of your interviews.

Questionnaires via Crowdsourcing (group, online participants): The purpose of this assignment is to get hands-on experience with writing questionnaire questions and with an online crowdsourcing/questionnaire platform. Your group will create a questionnaire, deploy it on an online crowdsourcing platform, and collect the results. Your group will turn in a writeup where you analyze the results and reflect on the process.

Project Presentation (group): We will be having project presentations at the end of the semester for the group projects. This is an opportunity to show off and communicate (visually and verbally) the project that your group has been working on throughout the semester. You will also be expected to provide some feedback regarding the presentations.

Final Group Project Report (group): The purpose of this assignment is to get hands-on experience with writing about research. As a group, you will construct a final report in the form of an academic paper where you present your research questions and the steps you took to answer those questions. Where appropriate, you can re-use or elaborate upon content from previous project write-ups.

 

Grading Scheme

The following grading standards will be used in this class:

Grade Range
A [94, 100]
A- [90, 94)
B+ [87, 90)
B [83, 87)
B- [80, 83)
C+ [77, 80)
C [73, 77)
C- [70, 73)
D+ [67, 70)
D [63, 67)
D- [60, 63)
F [0, 60)

 

College of Engineering and University Policies

Please be aware of the College of Engineering Guidelines.

Drop/Withdrawal. Students may drop a course within the first two weeks of a given semester without any penalties. Students may officially withdraw (W) from a class or all classes after the drop deadline through the midpoint of a course. A “W” grade is recorded on the transcript and appropriate tuition/fees are assessed. The grade “W” is not used in calculating the student’s GPA. For deadlines to withdraw from full-term, first, and second session classes, see the U's Academic Calendar. 

 

Academic Integrity. It is assumed that all work submitted to your instructor is your own work. When you have used the ideas of others, you must properly indicate that you have done so. Even if you do not directly quote (e.g., if you change some of the words or paraphrase) without citation, this is plagiarism and is a serious academic integrity offense. If you are not familiar with plagiarism, please see the U library resources on plagiarism for a primer.

Please do not share your individual assignments with other students. We've observed that often leads to wholesale copying. You may discuss how you approached the assignment with others, but each of you should write up your answer on your own. If you are concerned about the appearance of over-sharing, we recommend you add a note to your assignment listing who you discussed it with, what kind of discussion took place, and what topics were covered. In the past, some students have even included photos of whiteboards from these collaboration sessions.

Dishonesty in reporting is another form of academic misconduct. This includes fabrication of data, such as making up interview or think-aloud results, misreporting attendance, and lying about the work of other individuals in the course.

Unethical treatment of humans is not tolerated in this course and will be considered academic misconduct. Though we do not seek IRB approval for the assignments in this class because they are for educational purposes only, you are expected to treat participants with the same ethical standards as an IRB-approved study. Furthermore, you are expected to treat members of this class in a respectful and ethical manner.

Plagiarism and cheating are serious offenses and may be punished by failure on an individual assignment, and/or failure in the course. Academic misconduct, according to the University of Utah Student Code,

“...Includes, but is not limited to, cheating, misrepresenting one’s work, inappropriately collaborating, plagiarism, and fabrication or falsification of information…It also includes facilitating academic misconduct by intentionally helping or attempting to help another to commit an act of academic misconduct.”

For details on plagiarism and other important course conduct issues, see the U's Code of Student Rights and Responsibilities (Links to an external site.) as well as the School of Computing's Academic Misconduct Policy.

As this is a graduate course with a research focus, integrity is paramount. I will recommend course failure as a sanction for any academic integrity infraction.

 

Course Materials Copyright.  The Content is made available only for your personal, noncommercial educational, and scholarly use. You may not use the Content for any other purpose, or distribute, post or make the Content available to others unless you obtain any required permission from the copyright holder. Some Content may be provided via streaming or other means that restrict copying; you may not circumvent those restrictions. You may not alter or remove any copyright or other proprietary notices included in the Content. 

Please see the Code of Student Rights and Responsibilities (Links to an external site.), Section III.A.5 regarding the use and distribution of class Content (Links to an external site.) and materials. Section III.A.5. prohibits the following:
Sale or distribution of information representing the work product of a faculty member to a commercial entity for financial gain without the express written permission of the faculty member responsible for the course. (“Work product” means original works of authorship that have been fixed in a tangible medium and any works based upon and derived from the original work of authorship.)

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The University of Utah seeks to provide equal access to its programs, services, and activities for people with disabilities. If you will need accommodations in this class, reasonable prior notice needs to be given to the Center for Disability Services, 162 Olpin Union Building, (801) 581-5020. CDS will work with you and the instructor to make arrangements for accommodations. All written information in this course can be made available in an alternative format with prior notification to the Center for Disability Services.

Given the nature of this course, attendance is required and adjustments cannot be granted to allow non-attendance. However, if you need to seek an ADA accommodation to request an exception to this attendance policy due to a disability, please contact the Center for Disability and Access (CDA). CDA will work with us to determine what, if any, ADA accommodations are reasonable and appropriate.

 

Mental Health Resources. Rates of burnout, anxiety, depression, isolation, and loneliness have noticeably increased during the pandemic. If you need help, reach out for campus mental health resources, including free counseling, trainings and other support.

Consider participating in a Mental Health First Aid or other wellness-themed training provided by our Center for Student Wellness and sharing these opportunities with your peers, teaching assistants and department colleagues.

 

COVID-19 Resources and Policies. For the most up-to-date information on COVID-19 protocol, please refer to https://coronavirus.utah.edu/. 

Other resources are

  1. Student Guidance: What Steps to Take for a Possible or Confirmed COVID-19 Exposure
  2. Registrar’s Office COVID-19 Information and FAQ’s
  3. Housing & Residential Education

 

Addressing Sexual Misconduct. Title IX makes it clear that violence and harassment based on sex and gender (which Includes sexual orientation and gender identity/expression) is a civil rights offense subject to the same kinds of accountability and the same kinds of support applied to offenses against other protected categories such as race, national origin, color, religion, age, status as a person with a disability, veteran’s status or genetic information.  If you or someone you know has been harassed or assaulted, you are encouraged to report it to the Title IX Coordinator in the Office of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action, 135 Park Building, 801-581-8365, or the Office of the Dean of Students, 270 Union Building, 801-581-7066.  For support and confidential consultation, contact the Center for Student Wellness, 426 SSB, 801-581-7776.  To report to the police, contact the Department of Public Safety, 801-585-2677(COPS).

 

Undocumented Student Support Statement. Immigration is a complex phenomenon with broad impact—those who are directly affected by it, as well as those who are indirectly affected by their relationships with family members, friends, and loved ones. If your immigration status presents obstacles to engaging in specific activities or fulfilling specific course criteria, confidential arrangements may be requested from the Dream Center. Arrangements with the Dream Center will not jeopardize your student status, your financial aid, or any other part of your residence. The Dream Center offers a wide range of resources to support undocumented students (with and without DACA) as well as students from mixed-status families. To learn more, please contact the Dream Center at 801.213.3697 or visit dream.utah.edu.

 

Inclusivity Statement. I stand in support of compassion, dignity, value-of-life, equity, inclusion and justice for all individuals regardless of color, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, language, socioeconomic status, ability, gender, gender identity or expression, immigration status, or any type of marginalization. I stand in support of making our society more inclusive, just, and equitable for all individuals. I stand against individual and systemic racism in all its various forms.

Please see Student Support Organizations for a list of different support organizations on campus, each with specialized experience in different identities and circumstances.

 

Mandatory Reporter Notice

The instructor and teaching staff for this course are mandatory reporters. This means we must report instances of violence, harassment, and discrimination that we observe or that are reported to us. If you do not want your incident reported (or are not ready to have it reported), the University has several confidential options for talking about and receiving support for your situation:

Office of the Ombudsman | 801-213-3757 | facultyombudsman@hsc.utah.edu

University Counseling Center | 801-581-6826 | counselingcenter.utah.edu

Victim Survivor Advocates | 801-581-7776 | advocate.wellness.utah.edu | advocate@sa.utah.edu

Women's Resource Center | 801-581-8030 | womenscenter.utah.edu

 

Changelog

2022-08-28: Add Changelog. Fix spacing between ADA policy and Copyright Materials Policy

2022-08-22: Add instructor office location