Alexis Hope - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Alexis Hope
In this paper, we present an in-depth case study of the "Make the Breast Pump Not Suck!"... more In this paper, we present an in-depth case study of the "Make the Breast Pump Not Suck!" Hackathon at the MIT Media Lab in 2014. In recent years, there have been a proliferation of hackathons for social impact. Skeptics point out numerous shortcomings with hackathons, including poor problem-selection, diversity and inclusion issues around who participates, the exploitation of unpaid labor, the lack of impact and the dangers of positing purely technological solutions to sociotechnical issues. In the spirit of feminist epistemology, we first situate ourselves as the hackathon organizers, a small group mostly comprised of students at an elite engineering institution. Then we situate the focal object—the breast pump—as a sociotechnical design object that operates as a pain point at the intersection of social norms, historical and structural inequality, technological (un)innovation and flawed policy. We describe the event and outline our design goals, including prototyping new ...
Ultrasound imaging is an effective tool for identifying maternal mortality risk factors. However,... more Ultrasound imaging is an effective tool for identifying maternal mortality risk factors. However, the high cost of ultrasound devices and the scarcity of ultrasound training are two major barriers to adoption in the developing world. To address these barriers, we have designed an inexpensive ultrasound system with an integrated contextual help system. Our device is targeted at increasing the diagnostic capabilities of midwives—often central medical figures in resource-constrained communities. The user interface is designed to meet the needs of midwives with minimal training who will be using the system in remote areas. We describe how our integrated contextual help system will supplement a midwife’s conceptual foundation of diagnostic ultrasound through appropriate and adaptive scaffolding. In addition, we identify several future opportunities for incorporating computer vision and intelligent user interfaces to assist the user in performing tasks and adapt to the user’s changing edu...
We present the first full description of Media Cloud, an open source platform based on crawling h... more We present the first full description of Media Cloud, an open source platform based on crawling hyperlink structure in operation for over 10 years, that for many uses will be the best way to collect data for studying the media ecosystem on the open web. We document the key choices behind what data Media Cloud collects and stores, how it processes and organizes these data, and its open API access as well as userfacing tools. We also highlight the strengths and limitations of the Media Cloud collection strategy compared to relevant alternatives. We give an overview two sample datasets generated using Media Cloud and discuss how researchers can use the platform to create their own datasets.
Ethics, Political Perspective Taking, and Digital Games Colin Fitzpatrick, Alexis Hope, Salwa Bar... more Ethics, Political Perspective Taking, and Digital Games Colin Fitzpatrick, Alexis Hope, Salwa Barhumi, Yanna Krupnikov and Matthew W. Easterday Northwestern University Author Note Colin Fitzpatrick, School of Communication, Northwestern University; Alexis Hope, School of Communication, Northwestern University; Salwa Barhumi, School of Education and Social Policy, Northwestern University; Matthew W. Easterday, School of Education and Social Policy, Northwestern University; Yanna Krupnikov, Department of Political Science, Northwestern University Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to: Colin Fitzpatrick, School of Communication, Frances Searle, 2240 Campus Drive, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208 Email: fitzcn@u.northwestern.edu
Engaged citizenship requires understanding why different ideologies lead to different policy posi... more Engaged citizenship requires understanding why different ideologies lead to different policy positions. However, we know little about political perspective taking. How might we use games to teach citizens political perspective taking? This paper describes a design research project to develop a cognitive game for political perspective taking. Study 1 describes a political perspective taking measure created through expert and novice task analysis. Study 2 surveyed 187 undergraduate students and found relatively poor political perspective taking ability. Study 3 tests an educational game for political perspective taking and found that the game was engaging but did not promote learning. Study 4 describes a technical exploration testing the feasibility of a cognitive game with intelligent tutoring for scaffolding complex reasoning on political perspectives. This work argues games can teach political perspective taking using: (a) moral foundations theory, (b) fantasy environments that ask...
Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction
Initially conceived as problem-focused programming events, hackathons have expanded to encompass ... more Initially conceived as problem-focused programming events, hackathons have expanded to encompass a range of issue areas, stakeholders and activities. There have been important critiques of hackathons in relation to their format and structure, their epistemological assumptions, and their outputs and impacts. Scholars working in Feminist HCI have proposed design considerations for more inclusive hackathons that focus on social justice outcomes for marginalized groups. Evaluative work on hackathons has assessed entrepreneurial contributions, skill development, and affective impacts, but largely absent from the analysis is a view of longterm personal impacts on participants. What kinds of lasting impacts (if any) do issue-focused hackathons have on participants themselves? In this paper, we describe a post-hoc qualitative study with participants and organizers of a postpartum health hackathon in the U.S., one year after the event took place. Our goals were to understand people's motivations for participating, what impact (if any) their participation had on their lives, and how (if at all) their participation shaped how they now understand postpartum health. Our findings indicate that the hackathon functioned as a space of "feminist consciousness raising" in that it provided space for navigating and sharing personal experiences, contextualizing and connecting those experiences to structural oppression, and developing participants' self-and collective-efficacy to create design interventions and enact social change. Feminist consciousness raising is not just "awareness-raising", but rather a specific historic and contemporary practice which we describe and situate in relation to personal experiences of oppression around stigmatized topics. With these findings, we situate feminist consciousness raising in relation to the literature on hackathons and Feminist HCI, speculate which aspects of the design of the event led to it fostering feminist consciousness raising, and generate recommendations for how to intentionally bring feminist consciousness raising to the design of hackathons and innovation events. CCS Concepts: • Human-centered computing → Participatory design; • Social and professional topics → Race and ethnicity; Gender.
In recent years, there has been an unprecedented growth in content that is shared and presented o... more In recent years, there has been an unprecedented growth in content that is shared and presented on social media platforms. Along with this growth, however, there is an increasing concern over the lack of control social media users have on the content they are shown by invisible algorithms. In this paper, we introduce Gobo, an open-source social media browser system that enables users to manage and filter content from multiple platforms on their own. Gobo aims to help users control what's hidden from their feeds, add perspectives from outside their network to help them break filter bubbles, and explore why they see certain content on their feed. Through an iterative design process, we've built and deployed Gobo in the wild and conducted a pilot study in the form of a survey to understand how the users respond to the shift of control from invisible algorithms to themselves. Our initial findings suggest that Gobo has potential to provide an alternate design space to enhance control, transparency, and explainability in social media.
Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2019
Breastfeeding is not only a public health issue, but also a matter of economic and social justice... more Breastfeeding is not only a public health issue, but also a matter of economic and social justice. This paper presents an iteration of a participatory design process to create spaces for re-imagining products, services, systems, and policies that support breastfeeding in the United States. Our work contributes to a growing literature around making hackathons more inclusive and accessible, designing participatory processes that center marginalized voices, and incorporating systems-and relationship-based approaches to problem solving. By presenting an honest assessment of the successes and shortcomings of the first iteration of a hackathon, we explain how we restructured the second Make the Breast Pump Not Suck hackathon in service of equity and systems design. Key to our re-imagining of conventional innovation structures is a focus on experience design, where joy and play serve as key strategies to help people and institutions build relationships across lines of difference. We conclu...
International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations
Engaged citizenship requires understanding why different ideologies lead to different policy posi... more Engaged citizenship requires understanding why different ideologies lead to different policy positions. However, we know little about political perspective taking. How might we use games to teach citizens political perspective taking? This paper describes a design research project to develop a cognitive game for political perspective taking. Study 1 describes a political perspective taking measure created through expert and novice task analysis. Study 2 surveyed 187 undergraduate students and found relatively poor political perspective taking ability. Study 3 tests an educational game for political perspective taking and found that the game was engaging but did not promote learning. Study 4 describes a technical exploration testing the feasibility of a cognitive game with intelligent tutoring for scaffolding complex reasoning on political perspectives. This work argues games can teach political perspective taking using: (a) moral foundations theory, (b) fantasy environments that ask...
Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI '16, 2016
In recent years, the CHI community has begun to discuss how HCI research could improve the experi... more In recent years, the CHI community has begun to discuss how HCI research could improve the experience of motherhood. In this paper, we take up the challenge of designing for this complex life phase and present an analysis of data collected from a design process that included over 1,000 mothersubmitted ideas to improve the breast pump, a technology that allows mothers around the world to collect and store their breast milk. In addition to presenting a range of ideas to improve this specific technology, we discuss environmental, legal, social, and emotional dimensions of the postpartum period that suggest opportunities for a range of additional supportive technologies. We close with insights linking our findings to ongoing discussions related to Feminist HCI theory, crowdsourcing, and participatory design.
Encyclopedia of Otolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery, 2013
Online technologies are promising for helping older adults maintain social connectedness, particu... more Online technologies are promising for helping older adults maintain social connectedness, particularly with younger people, yet many older adults resist or participate minimally in the mainstream technologies used by younger members of their social network. We present results from an inter view study involving 22 older adults (age 71-92) to under stand communication preferences and values related to social media. Seniors articulate many concerns with online social media, including the time required for legitimate participa tion, the loss of deeper communication, content irrelevance, and privacy. Additionally, older adults engage in social prac tices that could be supported by online social technologies, but they rarely use such tools. The theme of material social communications emerges from our data, and we examine this in context of online social media. We conclude with design considerations for the development of social media for older adults, and as part of this we describe the notion of bridging technologies as a framework for intergenerational communi cation design.
CHI '13 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems on - CHI EA '13, 2013
In this paper, we present the design of Hero, a suite of learning tools that combine teacher-crea... more In this paper, we present the design of Hero, a suite of learning tools that combine teacher-created extracurricular challenges with in-class motivational tools to help parents become more involved in their child's education, while also engaging students in their own learning. To inform the design, we conducted field studies and interviews involving 7 primary teachers and 15 different families. We analyzed Chinese parenting styles and problems related to parental involvement, and developed three major themes from the data. We then proposed three design goals and created a highfidelity prototype after several iterations of user testing. A preliminary evaluation showed that teachers, parents, and students could all benefit from the design.
CHI '13 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems on - CHI EA '13, 2013
ABSTRACT Electrical circuits are difficult to understand. Novices tend to have incorrect understa... more ABSTRACT Electrical circuits are difficult to understand. Novices tend to have incorrect understandings of what happens at the level of atoms and electrons in a circuit, which leads to difficulty in understanding and predicting the outcomes of various electrical circuits. We are designing an interactive learning tool called Circuit in Pieces (CiP) that enables learners to interact with representations of electrical circuits at both a micro and a macro level. Using a research through design process that includes interviews and sessions with six students, we explore different approaches for interacting in and between levels. In this paper, we offer preliminary results and design implications for supporting switching between macro and micro level views.
In this paper, we present an in-depth case study of the "Make the Breast Pump Not Suck!"... more In this paper, we present an in-depth case study of the "Make the Breast Pump Not Suck!" Hackathon at the MIT Media Lab in 2014. In recent years, there have been a proliferation of hackathons for social impact. Skeptics point out numerous shortcomings with hackathons, including poor problem-selection, diversity and inclusion issues around who participates, the exploitation of unpaid labor, the lack of impact and the dangers of positing purely technological solutions to sociotechnical issues. In the spirit of feminist epistemology, we first situate ourselves as the hackathon organizers, a small group mostly comprised of students at an elite engineering institution. Then we situate the focal object—the breast pump—as a sociotechnical design object that operates as a pain point at the intersection of social norms, historical and structural inequality, technological (un)innovation and flawed policy. We describe the event and outline our design goals, including prototyping new ...
Ultrasound imaging is an effective tool for identifying maternal mortality risk factors. However,... more Ultrasound imaging is an effective tool for identifying maternal mortality risk factors. However, the high cost of ultrasound devices and the scarcity of ultrasound training are two major barriers to adoption in the developing world. To address these barriers, we have designed an inexpensive ultrasound system with an integrated contextual help system. Our device is targeted at increasing the diagnostic capabilities of midwives—often central medical figures in resource-constrained communities. The user interface is designed to meet the needs of midwives with minimal training who will be using the system in remote areas. We describe how our integrated contextual help system will supplement a midwife’s conceptual foundation of diagnostic ultrasound through appropriate and adaptive scaffolding. In addition, we identify several future opportunities for incorporating computer vision and intelligent user interfaces to assist the user in performing tasks and adapt to the user’s changing edu...
We present the first full description of Media Cloud, an open source platform based on crawling h... more We present the first full description of Media Cloud, an open source platform based on crawling hyperlink structure in operation for over 10 years, that for many uses will be the best way to collect data for studying the media ecosystem on the open web. We document the key choices behind what data Media Cloud collects and stores, how it processes and organizes these data, and its open API access as well as userfacing tools. We also highlight the strengths and limitations of the Media Cloud collection strategy compared to relevant alternatives. We give an overview two sample datasets generated using Media Cloud and discuss how researchers can use the platform to create their own datasets.
Ethics, Political Perspective Taking, and Digital Games Colin Fitzpatrick, Alexis Hope, Salwa Bar... more Ethics, Political Perspective Taking, and Digital Games Colin Fitzpatrick, Alexis Hope, Salwa Barhumi, Yanna Krupnikov and Matthew W. Easterday Northwestern University Author Note Colin Fitzpatrick, School of Communication, Northwestern University; Alexis Hope, School of Communication, Northwestern University; Salwa Barhumi, School of Education and Social Policy, Northwestern University; Matthew W. Easterday, School of Education and Social Policy, Northwestern University; Yanna Krupnikov, Department of Political Science, Northwestern University Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to: Colin Fitzpatrick, School of Communication, Frances Searle, 2240 Campus Drive, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208 Email: fitzcn@u.northwestern.edu
Engaged citizenship requires understanding why different ideologies lead to different policy posi... more Engaged citizenship requires understanding why different ideologies lead to different policy positions. However, we know little about political perspective taking. How might we use games to teach citizens political perspective taking? This paper describes a design research project to develop a cognitive game for political perspective taking. Study 1 describes a political perspective taking measure created through expert and novice task analysis. Study 2 surveyed 187 undergraduate students and found relatively poor political perspective taking ability. Study 3 tests an educational game for political perspective taking and found that the game was engaging but did not promote learning. Study 4 describes a technical exploration testing the feasibility of a cognitive game with intelligent tutoring for scaffolding complex reasoning on political perspectives. This work argues games can teach political perspective taking using: (a) moral foundations theory, (b) fantasy environments that ask...
Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction
Initially conceived as problem-focused programming events, hackathons have expanded to encompass ... more Initially conceived as problem-focused programming events, hackathons have expanded to encompass a range of issue areas, stakeholders and activities. There have been important critiques of hackathons in relation to their format and structure, their epistemological assumptions, and their outputs and impacts. Scholars working in Feminist HCI have proposed design considerations for more inclusive hackathons that focus on social justice outcomes for marginalized groups. Evaluative work on hackathons has assessed entrepreneurial contributions, skill development, and affective impacts, but largely absent from the analysis is a view of longterm personal impacts on participants. What kinds of lasting impacts (if any) do issue-focused hackathons have on participants themselves? In this paper, we describe a post-hoc qualitative study with participants and organizers of a postpartum health hackathon in the U.S., one year after the event took place. Our goals were to understand people's motivations for participating, what impact (if any) their participation had on their lives, and how (if at all) their participation shaped how they now understand postpartum health. Our findings indicate that the hackathon functioned as a space of "feminist consciousness raising" in that it provided space for navigating and sharing personal experiences, contextualizing and connecting those experiences to structural oppression, and developing participants' self-and collective-efficacy to create design interventions and enact social change. Feminist consciousness raising is not just "awareness-raising", but rather a specific historic and contemporary practice which we describe and situate in relation to personal experiences of oppression around stigmatized topics. With these findings, we situate feminist consciousness raising in relation to the literature on hackathons and Feminist HCI, speculate which aspects of the design of the event led to it fostering feminist consciousness raising, and generate recommendations for how to intentionally bring feminist consciousness raising to the design of hackathons and innovation events. CCS Concepts: • Human-centered computing → Participatory design; • Social and professional topics → Race and ethnicity; Gender.
In recent years, there has been an unprecedented growth in content that is shared and presented o... more In recent years, there has been an unprecedented growth in content that is shared and presented on social media platforms. Along with this growth, however, there is an increasing concern over the lack of control social media users have on the content they are shown by invisible algorithms. In this paper, we introduce Gobo, an open-source social media browser system that enables users to manage and filter content from multiple platforms on their own. Gobo aims to help users control what's hidden from their feeds, add perspectives from outside their network to help them break filter bubbles, and explore why they see certain content on their feed. Through an iterative design process, we've built and deployed Gobo in the wild and conducted a pilot study in the form of a survey to understand how the users respond to the shift of control from invisible algorithms to themselves. Our initial findings suggest that Gobo has potential to provide an alternate design space to enhance control, transparency, and explainability in social media.
Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2019
Breastfeeding is not only a public health issue, but also a matter of economic and social justice... more Breastfeeding is not only a public health issue, but also a matter of economic and social justice. This paper presents an iteration of a participatory design process to create spaces for re-imagining products, services, systems, and policies that support breastfeeding in the United States. Our work contributes to a growing literature around making hackathons more inclusive and accessible, designing participatory processes that center marginalized voices, and incorporating systems-and relationship-based approaches to problem solving. By presenting an honest assessment of the successes and shortcomings of the first iteration of a hackathon, we explain how we restructured the second Make the Breast Pump Not Suck hackathon in service of equity and systems design. Key to our re-imagining of conventional innovation structures is a focus on experience design, where joy and play serve as key strategies to help people and institutions build relationships across lines of difference. We conclu...
International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations
Engaged citizenship requires understanding why different ideologies lead to different policy posi... more Engaged citizenship requires understanding why different ideologies lead to different policy positions. However, we know little about political perspective taking. How might we use games to teach citizens political perspective taking? This paper describes a design research project to develop a cognitive game for political perspective taking. Study 1 describes a political perspective taking measure created through expert and novice task analysis. Study 2 surveyed 187 undergraduate students and found relatively poor political perspective taking ability. Study 3 tests an educational game for political perspective taking and found that the game was engaging but did not promote learning. Study 4 describes a technical exploration testing the feasibility of a cognitive game with intelligent tutoring for scaffolding complex reasoning on political perspectives. This work argues games can teach political perspective taking using: (a) moral foundations theory, (b) fantasy environments that ask...
Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI '16, 2016
In recent years, the CHI community has begun to discuss how HCI research could improve the experi... more In recent years, the CHI community has begun to discuss how HCI research could improve the experience of motherhood. In this paper, we take up the challenge of designing for this complex life phase and present an analysis of data collected from a design process that included over 1,000 mothersubmitted ideas to improve the breast pump, a technology that allows mothers around the world to collect and store their breast milk. In addition to presenting a range of ideas to improve this specific technology, we discuss environmental, legal, social, and emotional dimensions of the postpartum period that suggest opportunities for a range of additional supportive technologies. We close with insights linking our findings to ongoing discussions related to Feminist HCI theory, crowdsourcing, and participatory design.
Encyclopedia of Otolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery, 2013
Online technologies are promising for helping older adults maintain social connectedness, particu... more Online technologies are promising for helping older adults maintain social connectedness, particularly with younger people, yet many older adults resist or participate minimally in the mainstream technologies used by younger members of their social network. We present results from an inter view study involving 22 older adults (age 71-92) to under stand communication preferences and values related to social media. Seniors articulate many concerns with online social media, including the time required for legitimate participa tion, the loss of deeper communication, content irrelevance, and privacy. Additionally, older adults engage in social prac tices that could be supported by online social technologies, but they rarely use such tools. The theme of material social communications emerges from our data, and we examine this in context of online social media. We conclude with design considerations for the development of social media for older adults, and as part of this we describe the notion of bridging technologies as a framework for intergenerational communi cation design.
CHI '13 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems on - CHI EA '13, 2013
In this paper, we present the design of Hero, a suite of learning tools that combine teacher-crea... more In this paper, we present the design of Hero, a suite of learning tools that combine teacher-created extracurricular challenges with in-class motivational tools to help parents become more involved in their child's education, while also engaging students in their own learning. To inform the design, we conducted field studies and interviews involving 7 primary teachers and 15 different families. We analyzed Chinese parenting styles and problems related to parental involvement, and developed three major themes from the data. We then proposed three design goals and created a highfidelity prototype after several iterations of user testing. A preliminary evaluation showed that teachers, parents, and students could all benefit from the design.
CHI '13 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems on - CHI EA '13, 2013
ABSTRACT Electrical circuits are difficult to understand. Novices tend to have incorrect understa... more ABSTRACT Electrical circuits are difficult to understand. Novices tend to have incorrect understandings of what happens at the level of atoms and electrons in a circuit, which leads to difficulty in understanding and predicting the outcomes of various electrical circuits. We are designing an interactive learning tool called Circuit in Pieces (CiP) that enables learners to interact with representations of electrical circuits at both a micro and a macro level. Using a research through design process that includes interviews and sessions with six students, we explore different approaches for interacting in and between levels. In this paper, we offer preliminary results and design implications for supporting switching between macro and micro level views.