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Parisa Eslambolchilar

Dr Parisa Eslambolchilar

Reader

School of Computer Science and Informatics

Email
EslambolchilarP@cardiff.ac.uk
Telephone
+44 29208 79346
Campuses
Abacws, Room 3.51, Senghennydd Road, Cathays, Cardiff, CF24 4AG

Overview

News: From January 2023 until January 2025 I am taking a secondment in industry as a lead user experience consultant in Emeging Technologies. During this period I will be away from my duties at Cardiff University. 

Overview: I am a Reader (Associate Professor) in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). I lead the Cybersecurity, Privacy and Human-Centred Computing research section and Cardiff Human-Centred Computing research group at the School of Computer Science and Informatics. My research interests include human-computer interaction, ubiquitous computing and designing interactive systems to support self-reflection, self-monitoring, feedback (audio, haptic, visual and soma), persuasion, immersion and navigation. My work exploits Internet of Things, wearables, smartphones, augmented reality and virtual reality. Analytical orientations: experimental studies, design thinking and design ethnography.

I teach Design Thinking and Prototyping for User Experience (CM3116) to 3rd year undergraduate students at School of Computer Science and Informatics.

Additionally, I am an external examiner at Goldsmiths University, MSc UX Engineering. 

Publication

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018

2017

2016

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2006

2005

  • Strachan, S., Eslambolchilar, P., Murray-Smith, R., Hughes, S. and O'Modhrain, S. 2005. GpsTunes: controlling navigation via audio feedback. Presented at: Mobile HCI '05 7th international conference on human computer interaction with mobile devices & services, Salzburg, Austria, September 19 - 22, 2005MobileHCI '05 Proceedings of the 7th international conference on Human computer interaction with mobile devices & services. New York, NY, USA: ACM pp. 275-278., (10.1145/1085777.1085831)

2004

2003

Articles

Book sections

Books

Conferences

Research

My research interests include human-computer interaction, ubiquitous computing and designing interactive systems to support self-reflection, self-monitoring, feedback (audio, haptic, visual and soma), persuasion, immersion and navigation. My work exploits Internet of Things, wearables, smartphones, augmented reality and virtual reality. Analytical orientations: experimental studies, design thinking and auto-ethnography.

These interests have led me to conduct and or lead interdisciplinary projects over recent years which include:

  • Human-Building Interaction for Climate Change: Tangible visualisation of shared households's climate action
  • Making art (and artefacts) accessible to People with Low Vision - user centred design approach
  • Utilising Augmented Reality (AR) To Improve Mobility In People With Low Vision - user centred design approach (and collaboration with Guide Dogs, Cardiff Institute for the Blind (CIB) and Sight Cymru)
  • Enchanting Technologies to advance educational opportunities, support transition and promote social inclusion for young people with profound and multiple learning disabilities - user centred approach.
  • Designing and developing 3D printed tangible artefacts based on physical activity (PA) data (i.e. heart rate) for school children and adolescents as a form of weekly feedback - user centred approach.
  • Designing and developing a ubiquitous computing system with an ambient display in classrooms for promoting PA in school children - user centred approach.
  • Utilising a fluid dynamic model to assess a computational model of Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) to design and develop PA behaviour change interventions.
  • Designing and developing a smartphone application called bActive, which applied and tested the theory of social feedback in PA behaviour change through a randomised control trial.
  • Designing and developing physical interactions with various number entry systems in infusion pumps and investigating the impact of such interaction in human errors.

My overarching professional goal is to use innovative technology (including embedded sensors) in applications with large-scale social and human impact.

Successful Funding Applications (selected)

2019 Guide Dogs for the Blind funding on Utilising Augmented Reality (AR) to Improve Mobility in People with Low Vision, Sept 2019 for 24 months.
2019 Leverhulme Trust International Fellowship, Principle Investigator, April-Sept 2021. 
2019 WEFO-ERDF Centre for AI, Robotics and Human-Machine Systems (IROHMS), Co-Investigator
2018 Cardiff University VC international PhD studentship for Research Excellence: Awarded to Mr Hein Min Htike to start from October 2018
2018 "Smoke Detector" for IoT Cybersecurity, Innovate UK Cyber security academic start-ups programme Phase 2, Co-Investigator
2018 Cardiff Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme (CUROP) – 1st year UG student research work in Interactive VR Storytelling, co-supervisor with JOMEC, June – Aug 2018,
2018 Cardiff Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme (CUROP) – 2nd year UG student research work in Be Active - an Android application to promote physical activity, primary supervisor, June – Aug 2018,
2018 Cardiff Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme (CUROP) – 3rd year UG student research work in Guide The Way: Real-time guide indoors and outdoors for partially sighted people with HoloLens, primary supervisor, June – Aug 2018,
2016 Principle Investigator (PI) in Research Impact Fund (IAA) grant “Chronic Back Pain Management in Communities Using Portable Sensors”
2015-2018 Co-Investigator (CoI) in NISCHR Brain Repair And Intracranial Neurotherapeutics- Wales BRAIN Unit
2014-2018 CoI in NISCHR PhD studentship award in Social Care: The development and evaluation of an online emotional wellbeing module in the Champions for Health programme to complement and enhance lifestyle improvements. 
2014 Strategic Insight Programme fund, Secondment in Public Health Wales
2014 Travel fund to visit University of Grenoble 
2013-2014 CoI in “Bridging The Gaps: Computer-based measures of attentional function in ageing and dementia”
2013 Wales European Collaboration Fund to visit Japan
2009-2012 CoI in Digital Economy (DE) Sandpit Project CHARM: “Digital technology: shaping consumer behaviour by informing conceptions of 'normal' practice” (ref EP/H006966/1). 
2009-2015 EPSRC Programme Grant CHI+MED: “Multidisciplinary Computer-Human Interaction research for the design and safe use of interactive medical devices”  (ref EP/G059063/1). 
2008-2011 CoI in EPSRC Platform Grant FIT Lab/UCLIC PLATFORM: "Healthy interactive systems: Resilient, Usable and Appropriate Systems in Healthcare” (ref EP/G003971).

Teaching

Courses/modules taught:

I teach Design Thinking and Prototyping for User Experience (CM3116) to 3rd year undergraduate students at School of Computer Science and Informatics.

This module aims to provide the students with in-depth and hands-on understanding of user experience (UX) design in the context of software (from apps to large software), device platforms (from smartphones to ubiquitous computing and robots), and a wide range of interaction modalities (e.g., input and output), from voice and audio to gesture and tactile. The module will help to understand users and their needs better, and ethical, fair, accessible, sustainable, inclusive, usable, and effective user designs and theories. Additionally, students will learn what user experience is about and how to design and develop digital tools that offer fulfilling user experiences. Moreover, students will learn about the number of factors that influence user experience; the theories that underlie good interaction design; and the methods and techniques designers use to create effective interactive products.

Topic areas that I would like to supervise in:

  • Climate action and human-building interaction
  • Mobile/Wearable Human-Computer Interaction
  • Dynamic Continuous Interaction
  • Physical Activity
  • Mental health and well being
  • Ubiquitous Interaction
  • Tangible Interaction
  • Sonification

University initiatives I currently contribute to:

  1. Personal tutor for year 1 UGT students
  2. Personal tutor for MSc students
  3. Module leader for Design Thinking and Prototyping for UX CM3116
  4. Project supervisor for UGT and PGT students

Biography

Education and qualifications

  • 2003–2006      PhD in Computer Science, Hamilton Institute, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Ireland
  • 2000–2002      Masters in Eng. (2-year programme) in Robotics and Artificial Intelligence, University of Tehran (Iran)
  • 1994–1999      Bachelors in Eng. (4-year programme) in Computer Hardware Engineering, University of Amirkabir (Tehran, Iran)

Career overview

  • August 2019 - present         Reader at School of Computer Science and Informatics, Cardiff University
  • March 2017 - July 2019       Senior lecturer at School of Computer Science and Informatics, Cardiff University
  • September 2015 - present   Honorary contracted researcher in Public Health Highlands
  • July 2014- Aug 2015            Honorary contracted researcher in Public Health Wales
  • Jan 2015– April 2015           Visiting Professor in University of Grenoble (Engineering Human Computer Interaction Group)
  • June 2013-Jan 2017            Associate Professor, HCI, Computer Science Department, Swansea University
  • March 2007-June 2013        Assistant Professor, HCI Computer Science Department, Swansea University
  • Oct 2006- Feb 2007             Research fellow, Hamilton Institute, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Ireland
  • April 2003-Oct 2006             Research assistant/PhD student, Hamilton Institute, National University of Ireland, Maynooth

Honours and awards

  • British Science Festival 2016 team: Modelling Activity using Real-time Sensors (MARS): How long does it take to burn off a MARS bar, video
  • Best paper awards in ACM conferences (ICDL 2010, ECDL 2009 and Mobile HCI 2009)
  • Ranked second in RoboFesta-2001 (Robot Festival Games - Partner Robots, 23-25 Nov, Yokohama, Japan)

Professional memberships

  • HEA fellowship
  • EPSRC Associate Peer Review College member, 2016- present
  • Member of College of Experts, Welsh Government, July 2015- present

Committees and reviewing

  1. Head of the MEng Computer Science Students, 2010 – Jan 2017 @ Swansea University.
  2. Head of the Advance masters in Human-Computer Interaction, 2012 – 2014 @ Swansea University.
  3. Head of the Masters with Research in Future Interaction Technologies, 2012-2014 @ Swansea University.
  4. Swansea University Athena SWAN committee member: 2008- 2009.
  5. Member of Research Committee, College of Science, Swansea University 2012-2015.
  6. Engineering and ICCT liaison officer: 2008 - Jan 2017 @ Swansea University.
  7. British Computer Society (BCS) Accreditation liaison officer: 2009 - Jan 2017 @ Swansea University.

Invitations for International Programme Committee (IPC)/Peer Reviewing/Refereeing of Publications and Grant Applications

  1. Associate Chair (AC) at the ACM conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) 2017
  2. AC at the ACM conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) 2016
  3. 6th International Workshop on Human Behavior Understanding (HBU) at UBICOMP'15, Programme Committee (PC) member, 2015
  4. The ACM conference on Mobile HCI, PC member, 2015
  5. Dagstuhl seminar on “Life-long health behavior-change Technologies”, Germany, invited guest, June 2015
  6. The ACM conference on Mobile and Ubiquitous Multimedia (MUM 2015), PC member, 2015
  7. The Scandinavian Conference on Information System (SCIS), PC member, 2015
  8. Panel member, Doctoral Consortium, Mobile HCI 2014
  9. Reviewer for Cancer Charity, Tenovus, UK
  10. Reviewer for National Institute for Health Research (NIHR)
  11. Reviewer for the Royal Society-the UK’s National Academy of Science (royalsociety.org)
  12. The ACM journal of TOCHI journal, reviewer
  13. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies (IJHCS), reviewer
  14. International Journal of Mobile Human-Computer Interaction (IJMHCI), reviewer
  15. Elsevier Journal of Personal and Ubiquitous Computing Reviewer (PUC), reviewer, guest editor
  16. The Journal of Computer Science and Technology (JCST), reviewer
  17. Chairing Doctoral Consortium at Pervasive Health 2013
  18. Chairing workshops at Mobile HCI 2012
  19. Chairing videos UbiComp 2012
  20. The ACM conference on Mobile and Ubiquitous Multimedia (MUM 2013), PC member, 2013
  21. The ACM conference on Pervasive Health 2012, PC member
  22. The ACM conference on UbiComp 2011, PC member
  23. The ACM conference/workshops on CHI, reviewer since 2009
  24. The ACM conference on Mobile Human-Computer Interaction (Mobile HCI), reviewer since 2005
  25. The ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, reviewer 2008,2009
  26. The ACM conference on wearable computing conference ISWC 2010, reviewer
  27. The ACM conference Tangible Embedded Interaction (TEI) and INTERACT, reviewer since 2008
  28. The first ACM International Workshop on Mobile Systems for Computational Social Science, Lake District, UK 2012, PC member
  29. Programme Chair, CHARM conference, London, UK, 27th of February 2013
  30. Second CHI+MED summer workshop co-organiser (with Dr Karen Li), engaging with the designers, Swansea August 2011
  31. The ACM workshop on Dynamic & Continuous Computer-Human Interaction: Human and Computers around a loop (DACCHI 2013 at EICS 2013), Organiser
  32. The ACM workshop on Persuasion, Influence, Nudge and Coercion through mobile devices (PINC 2011 @ CHI 2011), Organiser
  33. The ACM workshop on Nudge & Influence through Mobile Devices (NIMD’10 @ MobileHCI 2010), Organiser

Supervisions

Current MPhil/PhD students at Cardiff University:

  • Ms Dushani Perera: Visualising Climate Actions of Households Through a Shared Data Sculpture to Trigger Behavioural Change, started in 2021
  • Mr Paul Goddard: Art Accessibility for People With Low Vision Utilising Augmented Reality (AR), started in 2021
  • Mr Hein Min Htike: Utilising Augmented Reality (AR) to Improve Mobility In People With Low Vision, started in 2018

Completed MPhil/PhD students at Cardiff University:

  • Dr Majedah Alrehiely (Personal Visualisation and Personal Visual Analytics) completed in 2020.

I am always keen to consider supervising novel and interesting proposals for PhD research. If you would like to submit an application you will need to follow the procedure outlined on the University postgraduate research pages. The process requires applicants to identify a potential supervisor as part of their application. Feel free to contact me to discuss supervision, but before you do please consider the following points:

I have a small number of example research projects published online (see here and here ), but I prefer potential students to have developed their own research proposal. It is helpful if you identify in advance:

  • The scope of your project (i.e. what are the research questions and problems?)
  • The current state of the art (i.e. summarise the existing literature that has been published on your chosen research topic)
  • Current limitations (i.e. identify the "gaps" in existing literature in relation to the scope of your project)
  • Users (i.e. who are the users (primary, secondary and tertiary) ? )
  • Proposed research methods (i.e. what Human-Computer Interaction methods, frameworks, theories will you use to tackle the current limitations and develop new knowledge?)
  • Anticipated contribution to Computer Science (i.e. what will we know after your PhD that we do not know now?)

There is some flexibility to a PhD research project and ideas will develop over time, but it is useful to begin from a structure as described above.

Please take the time to read my work and read the work I have cited (Publications tab), and develop the scope of your project around similar topics i.e. please ensure that your research proposal is directly related to my research interests (Research tab).

External profiles