I am an Associate Professor at Indiana University and I lead the Community-Computer Interaction Lab (C-CIL). I am also a Visiting Researcher at Newcastle University and a Visiting Professor at Beijing Normal University.
I have previously been:
- an Assistant Professor at Purdue University.
- an external research collaborator with Facebook.
- a postdoc (Research Associate) at Open Lab within Newcastle University.
- a PhD student studying Informatics in the School of Informatics and Computing at Indiana University, with a minor in Inquiry Methodology.
- a Master’s student studying Human Computer Interaction Design at Indiana University.
- a Bachelor of Science student studying Computer Science at Ball State University, with a minor in Mathematics.
My research interests center on the impact that digital technologies have on how communities are formed and maintained. I am particularly interested in how certain kinds of relationships between individuals within a community are encouraged while others are discouraged, and how various technologies are used to implicitly enforce these distinctions. How interpersonal relationships are sanctioned (in both senses of the word) plays a vital role in the inclusivity, welcomeness, and diversity of a community.
In prior work I have studied maker, hacker, and DIY communities through both physical and digital ethnographies, the participatory design of hackathon-like events, and large-scale listserv communication analyses. In that work, I focused on explicating the ways in which individuals develop identities as makers/hackers/expert-amateurs, as well as how they participate in their community. In my post-doctoral work on digital civics, I extended the methodological lenses I have developed to threads related to social care, civic engagement, and health informatics, specifically focusing on how individuals transition to their lives as new parents. As a professor, I have applied these insights to communities of video game players, a wide variety of Communities of Practice (including mental health professionals and industrial manufacturing companies), and co-living, co-housing, and co-working communities.
My research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the Department of Defense, and the Wabash Heartland Innovation Network.