As remote collaboration becomes central to contemporary work, it is crucial to understand how digital tools shape user experience (UX) and work engagement. This study examines how product design teams use Miro, an online collaborative whiteboard (OCW), to support collaboration in remote and hybrid work contexts. We identify unity as a core positive experience, consisting of four experiential forms: aggregation, relationality, connection, and fun. Using a sociomaterial lens, we show how these experiences emerge not from tool features alone, but from their entanglement with situated practices. Our contributions are fivefold: we (1) conceptualize unity as a distinct dimension of positive UX; (2) offer an epistemological response to HCI’s call for relational, entangled approaches; (3) trace how unity emerges through sociomaterial configurations; (4) link these experiences to psychological need fulfilment and work engagement; and (5) demonstrate how positive UX arises through ordinary moments of digital work.

Older adults are often subjected to online attacks and can be vulnerable to social engineering. In addition to direct harms, this may contribute towards lower rates of technology use and digital literacy in older populations. Since September 2019, we have worked with older adult volunteers to create a peer-to-peer cybersecurity advocacy initiative. We present a thematic analysis of longitudinal qualitative data that explores links between cybersecurity and digital literacy. Our findings highlight a technical ceiling that limited some proactive changes for peer advocates and for those they reached. We suggest that overcoming such issues requires significant practical familiarity, aided by the provision of repeat practice in a safe environment and with longitudinal support. This, we position as part of a need for the integration of cybersecurity training within digital literacy education for older learners. Finally, we elaborate on the structure of our engagement in terms of layered and distributed scaffolding.

Human-computer interaction (HCI) and natural language processing (NLP) research increasingly explore large language model (LLM) support for online content moderation tasks. This study conducts a value sensitive design process with volunteer moderators of two heavily-moderated subreddits (history Q&A, and legal advice). Through an empirical investigation using iterative interviews and a conceptual investigation centered in virtue ethics, we find moderators center values of care, wisdom, and civics in their work. A technical investigation then matches these values to the known capabilities and limitations of LLMs. We find current LLMs potentially well-suited to supporting care in managing sensitive content and wisdom in bridging content to context. However, many aspects of civic community-building are challenging to support with today's models. Our study provides guidelines for designing LLM support for moderation tools, and demonstrates value sensitive design methods to connect work practices, values, and the possibilities and limits of automation.

Shared Augmented Reality (Shared AR) is an emerging technology that enables multiple users to interact synchronously within a collocated AR environment. Yet, there is limited research on the group interactions and dynamics in Shared AR, particularly in the context of gaming. To address this gap, we investigate Shared AR group interactions using a phone-based Shared AR mobile game called Urban Legends . Through in situ observations, focus groups, and one-on-one interviews with 22 participants, we examine how users collaborate and communicate within the game. Our findings reveal that while verbal communication predominates, non-verbal cues are often overlooked by collocated participants, and users initially struggle to recognize the expansive virtual space and the need for physical movement. Over time, users adapt to the hybrid environment, demonstrating increasing spatial awareness and more dynamic collaboration. Based on these insights, we present a suite of design recommendations for enhancing spatial awareness, supporting multi-modal communication, and fostering engaging group dynamics in future Shared AR applications.

AI technologies, despite having well-documented biases and shortcomings, are becoming increasingly pervasive across various aspects of society. AI biases often reflect and interact with broader societal biases, underscoring the need to support children in understanding these biases so that they can identify when they (or others) are being discriminated against by an AI-based system. To explore this learning through a new methodology, we built an interactive system called CLIP4KIDS. We conducted four classroom sessions with 28 fifth graders in the United States and examined our data using qualitative thematic analysis. Students frequently described AI biases in terms of “assumptions” and “stereotypes” and drew connections between historical injustices and present biases in AI models. This work contributes a novel tool for learning about AI biases, an empirical account of children’s experiences, and a theoretical analysis incorporating Vossoughi and Gutiérrez’s framework of critical pedagogy and sociocultural theory.

Spreadsheet programming is challenging. Programmers use spreadsheet programming knowledge (e.g., formulas) and problem-solving skills to combine actions into complex tasks. Advancements in large language models have introduced language agents that observe, plan, and perform tasks, showing promise for spreadsheet creation. We present TableTalk, a spreadsheet programming agent embodying three design principles—scaffolding, flexibility, and incrementality—derived from studies with seven spreadsheet programmers and 85 Excel templates. TableTalk guides programmers through structured plans based on professional workflows, generating three potential next steps to adapt plans to programmer needs. It uses pre-defined tools to generate spreadsheet components and incrementally build spreadsheets. In a study with 20 programmers, TableTalk produced higher-quality spreadsheets 2.3 times more likely to be preferred than the baseline. It reduced cognitive load and thinking time by 12.6%. From this, we derive design guidelines for agentic spreadsheet programming tools and discuss implications on spreadsheet programming, end-user programming, AI-assisted programming, and human-agent collaboration.

Social platforms have expanded opportunities for deliberation with the comments being used to inform one's opinion. However, using such information to form opinions is challenged by unsubstantiated or false content. To enhance the quality of opinion formation and potentially confer resistance to misinformation, we developed Iffy-Or-Not ( ION ), a browser extension that seeks to invoke critical thinking when reading texts. With three features guided by argumentation theory, ION highlights fallacious content, suggests diverse queries to probe them with, and offers deeper questions to consider and chat with others about. From a user study ( \(N=18\) ), we found that ION encourages users to be more attentive to the content, suggests queries that align with or are preferable to their own, and poses thought-provoking questions that expands their perspectives. However, some participants expressed aversion to ION due to misalignments with their information goals and thinking predispositions. Potential backfiring effects with ION are discussed.

Reflection provides students and instructors insight into mindsets, learning progress, and course design. However, most reflective activities in HCI courses focus on specific skills and content. We propose sketching as a flexible and expressive medium for reflecting on larger topics to reveal implicit perspectives about multifaceted concepts of HCI. We developed “Sketching Snapshots,” an activity to elicit student perspectives on high-level concepts. To evaluate this activity, we ran pre- and post-semester workshops in two HCI courses in the US and UK. We analyze 68 sketches from 41 students, 9 student interviews, and 2 instructor interviews and find that sketching is effective for supporting student and instructor reflection. We then report case studies in two additional contexts and synthesize recommendations for deploying reflective sketching. We propose incorporating Sketching Snapshots in courses can facilitate reflection on complex concepts, improve teaching, and spark conversations about what HCI means to us and our students.

Recent work has looked to understand user perceptions of speech agent capabilities as dialogue partners (termed partner models), and how this affects user interaction. Yet, partner model effects are currently inferred from language production as no metrics are available to quantify these subjective perceptions more directly. Through three phases of work, we develop and validate the Partner Modelling Questionnaire (PMQ): an 18-item self-report semantic differential scale designed to reliably measure people’s partner models of non-embodied speech interfaces. Through confirmatory factor analysis, we confirm that the PMQ scale consists of three factors: communicative competence and dependability, human-likeness in communication and communicative flexibility. Our studies show that the measure consistently demonstrates good internal reliability, strong test-retest reliability over 4- and 12-week intervals, and predictable convergent/divergent validity. Based on our findings, we discuss the multidimensional nature of partner models, while identifying key future research avenues that the development of the PMQ facilitates. Notably, this includes the need to identify the activation, sensitivity, and dynamism of partner models in speech interface interaction.

A large number of studies highlight the importance of regulation in collaborative learning (CL). Nevertheless, only some studies describe how to get or support pupils to learn to regulate group work in school. In this context, we aim to understand if a specifically designed tangible environment can promote a regulated collaboration process during a face-to-face activity in school. Therefore, we conducted a 2-year design-based research (DBR) study. This article describes the DBR cycles in detail, and the steps we have executed to develop, test, implement, and evaluate a set of tangible artifacts called Collective attention led by a Mediated environment (CalMe). First, we identified three specific dimensions that interfere with CL in the classroom: team building and collective decision-making, task regulation awareness, and over-solicitation limitation. Second, we proposed design choices leading to the first iteration of a CalMe device that meets these needs. We then assessed usability and acceptability before the pedagogical validation steps. Third, through a pilot study, we evaluated the pedagogical potential of the second iteration of the CalMe device in a real context of use in an elementary school class. We collected and analyzed data from surveys, focus groups, log data, and video recordings through all the steps. Moreover, to allow for duplication of the study, we propose and detail our methodological approach. This study shows an empirical example of a DBR process that allows responding as closely as possible to the needs of both pupils and teachers. This work also provides input to teachers regarding a better understanding of collaborative problem-solving activities. Although there is still room for improvement on specific dimensions related to task regulation, such as better management of ambient noise or work tempo, the results indicate that the CalMe device allows for a regulated collaboration process in schools. It shows an human–computer interaction design process that can be an example of how to influence classroom activities through technology to promote positive CL experiences.