Informatics Ph.D. student Clara Caldeira presented a paper, “Routine Self-tracking of Health: Reasons, Facilitating Factors, and the Potential Impact on Health Management Practices,” which took third place at the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) 2017 Annual Symposium Student Paper Competition in Washington, D.C., at the beginning of November. The paper was co-authored by fellow Ph.D. studentMayara Costa Figueiredo, as well as Informatics Professors Yunan Chen and Kai Zheng. The paper uses data from the Pew Survey on Tracking for Health to examine the patterns of self-tracking activity to understand reasons for this behavior and its impact on health management practices. This year, AMIA selected five papers led by Ph.D. students in the Health and Information (HAI) Lab within UCI’s Department of Informatics.
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‘Are Video Games Harming My Son?’ Informatics Professor Constance Steinkuehler Discusses Response
November 1, 2017
At the recent UCI Department of Informatics Fall 2017 Seminar Series, “Played: Videogames, Kids and Moms,” Informatics Professor and President of the Higher Education Video Game Alliance, Constance Steinkuehler, set out to discuss a question many mothers have asked her over the years: “Are video games harming my son?”
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New Report Finds Tech Inequality Persists, Proposes Solutions
October 31, 2017
Free and open technologies do not democratize education, but strategies to combat educational inequity exist and should be replicated, a new report by digital learning experts recommends.
The report —“From Good Intentions to Real Outcomes: Equity by Design in Learning Technologies” — published today proposes following promising strategies the authors found that are addressing equity in learning technologies. New technologies, even free ones, they argue, disproportionately benefit students with the financial, social, and technical capital to take advantage of them.
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Tanenbaum’s Interactive ‘Magia Transformo’ Game a Hit at IndieCade Festival
October 27, 2017
Ever since Tess Tanenbaum, assistant professor of informatics, first learned about IndieCade as a graduate student back in 2008, she has wanted to participate in the international festival of independent games. This year, she got her chance with her visionary game, “Magia Transformo – the Dance of Transformation.” Out of approximately 1,000 submissions, “Magia Transformo” was one of just 104 selected as a demo for the IndieCade Festival 2017, held Oct. 6-8 in Los Angeles.
Lopes Analyzes Big Code with Funding from DARPA
October 25, 2017
Informatics Professor Cristina Lopes received a $600,000 Defense Advanced Research Agency (DARPA) grant under the Mining and Understanding Software Enclaves (MUSE) program. The program was started with the goal of reviewing billions of lines of open-source code to discover new relationships among this “big code,” thereby helping to build more robust software. As part of this effort, Lopes is researching software analytics for big code.
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WalletHub: “2017’s States Most Vulnerable to Identity Theft & Fraud” (Dourish quoted)
October 18, 2017
Information online, of course, does have a major role to play, especially in light of incidents like that with Equifax. The spread of social media does factor into this in a number of ways. One is obviously the fact that we all have more and more information online, but another is that, even if the accounts don’t have access to sensitive information, each social media account is a potential source of weakness for the security of your information, especially when it can potentially be used to impersonate you and gain access to other information held at other sites. This is also why it’s important to use unique passwords for each site, so that if your password is compromised, you can limit the damage.
Read the full story at WalletHub.
ICS Welcomes 9 New Faculty for 2017
October 17, 2017
The Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences is pleased to introduce the following nine faculty who joined ICS in calendar year 2017. Emphasizing its strategic priorities in the areas of data science and digital media and learning, these outstanding researchers and educators will be instrumental in moving the school forward as it continues to lead in the exploration of computing technologies and the ways in which they revolutionize the world around us.
Washington Post: “Video game players get varsity treatment at more US colleges”
September 15, 2017
Students who represent their schools say it teaches them lessons in strategy, teamwork and time management, and it offers camaraderie with other gamers on campus.
“It really builds a sense of community,” said Griffin Williams, a senior at UC Irvine who captains a team for the game “Super Smash Bros. Melee.” ‘’I actually feel more school pride than I would have had otherwise.”
Read the full story at The Washington Post.
UCI part of NSF-funded study of big data ethics
September 11, 2017
UCI principal investigator Matthew Bietz, assistant informatics researcher in the Donald Bren School of Information & Computer Sciences, will lead a team exploring how those who create pervasive data – through social media, fitness trackers, etc. – feel about it being used in research. The group will also focus on how vulnerable populations are affected. “Big data has the potential to transform our understanding of human behavior and health,” Bietz said. “We want to ensure that this research is conducted ethically and in line with individuals’ expectations.”
Read the full story at UCI News.
Deadline: “Amazon Prime Unveils Kids Fall Slate” (Ito mentioned)
September 8, 2017
When you give a mouse a cookie, he’ll probably ask for a glass of milk, and then…who knows what he’ll ask for next? Based on the beloved books by Laura Numeroff and Felicia Bond, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie follows the adventures of Mouse, Oliver, Moose, Pig, Cat, and Dog, as they discover that when you’ve got a curious Mouse for a friend one thing always leads to another, then another, and then another! The show’s learning approach was developed in consultation with authors Mimi Ito and John Seely Brown and revolves around a cause and effect narrative structure that sparks imagination and the creativity engendered by knowing that possibilities are endless.
Read the full story at Deadline.