justine at northwestern dot edu
Justine Cassell (Ph.D., University of Chicago) has joined the department of Communication Studies and the department of Computer Science as professor. Cassell comes to Northwestern from the MIT Media Lab, where she headed the Gesture and Narrative Language research group. Cassell's research focuses on understanding natural forms of communication, and then creating technological tools for those forms of communication and linguistic expression to flourish in the digital world. In particular, she is credited with developing the Embodied Conversational Agent, a virtual human capable of interacting with humans using both language and nonverbal behavior. More recently Cassell has investigated the role that the ECA can play in children's lives, as a part of a Story Listening System, an interactive support for learning language and literacy skills.
Justine is the graduate director of the Technology and Social Behavior joint PhD in Communication and Computer Science. She is also the director of the Center for Technology and Social Behavior.
More information is available on Justine's website.
Ph.D. Students
Brooke Foucault
b-foucault at northwestern dot edu
Brooke Foucault is a Ph.D. student in the Media, Technology, and Society program. She received M.S. and B.S. degrees from Cornell University where she was a member of the Human Computer Interaction lab. Her research aims to understand how technology can be used for social and public good. Currently, Brooke is working on the Survey Interview Project to develop new survey interviewing technologies that improve
our ability to collect data about sensitive subjects.
Andrea Tartaro
andrea at cs dot northwestern dot edu
Andrea Tartaro is a Ph.D. candidate in the Technology and Social Behavior program, the joint Ph.D. in computer science and communication studies. Her research explores developing innovative technology tools for children with special needs to help them access social and learning opportunities. In particular, her dissertation research involves designing, building and evaluating a new kind of "authorable" virtual peer that will allow children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) to learn about social interaction with peers by building their own virtual humans and observing how they interact with people. A virtual peer is a life-sized, computer-animated character that looks like a child and interacts with children using both speech and gestures. The authorable virtual peer will offer children with ASD a space to play with social communication, social interaction and imagination - skills that come naturally to typically-developing children, but are the most challenging for children with autism. This research employs new methods in Human-Computer Interaction for designing and implementing interactive virtual characters, and improves our understanding of the educational and communciation needs of children with ASD. For more information visit http://www.cs.northwestern.edu/andrea/.
Paul Tepper
ptepper at northwestern dot edu
Paul Tepper is a PhD student in the Media, Technology & Society program in the Dept. of Communication Studies. Paul's current research is looking at the coordinated generation of language and novel iconic gestures in a direction giving scenario, for the NUMACK embodied conversational agent project. For this work he is also investigating the presence of systematicity in the form and meaning of iconic gestures through empirical investigation, along with doctors Justine Cassell and Stefan Kopp. In 2003, Paul completed an MSc in Artificial Intelligence, specializing in Human Language Technology at University of Edinburgh's School of Informatics. Previous to this, he graduated from Rutgers College, Rutgers University, with a triple major in Computer Science, Cognitive Science and Linguistics, participating in research at the Rutgers U. Center for Cognitive Science and the Village Lab. Paul's previous research includes work in computational linguistics, natural language generation, knowledge representation and psycholinguistics. For more information see his personal homepage.
Staff
Miriam Davidson
m-davidson at northwestern dot edu
Miriam Davidson joined the CTSB in August 2009. She earned an MS in Computer Science from Illinois Institute of Technology and a B.A. in Quantitative Economics from Tufts University. With experience in software engineering and project management, Miriam has worked for the educational, financial and game sectors, at times melding the realms of education and entertainment with embodied conversational agents, instructional videos, tools and games to enhance students' classroom learning possibilities. As ArticuLab's IS Architecture Engineer, Miriam is serving as the lead software engineer on the "Alex" project, collaborating with the graduate students, supervising the research assistants and technical assistants and maintaining the efficiency of the lab.
When designing software architecture, she first considers how the intended audience behaves and thinks. Miriam reports that her work is driven by a desire "to provide clean architectural design and to devise accurate and efficient algorithms." She enjoys creating engaging game play and easily understandable user interfaces.
In her free time, she is a strong supporter of sustainable farming, educational gardening, community music and cooperative education.
Kathleen Geraghty
k-geraghty at northwestern dot edu
Kathleen is a Research Associate in the ArticuLab. She earned her MSc in Developmental Linguistics at the University of Edinburgh in 2007 and her BA in English and Global Studies from Alverno College. Kathleen's primary research interest is the role of social factors in child second language acquisition and improving learning outcomes for second language learners.
In the Articulab, she is the Project Manager for the NSF-funded study 'Bridging the Achievement Gap with Authorable Virtual Peers,' (better known to the lab members as 'Alex'). The team is currently working to develop a code-switching virtual peer to engage African American English-speaking children in science-based collaborative play and promote literacy development. Kathleen is also the Lab Manager and a researcher in the Lab for Collaborative Technologies (CollaboLab), with Dr. Darren Gergle.
Mark Mangoba
mmangoba at northwestern dot edu
Mark Mangoba, a Chicago native, was inspired by his parents to work and study hard, and ultimately found his home in the world of technology. Â Mark's educational path has been eclectic and impressive. As well as obtaining his BA in Information Technology at DePaul University, Mark has also studied Engineering Law at the University of Illinois, and Information and Web Technologies at Stanford University, but ultimately he discovered that the intersection between technology and education is his career passion. Before coming to the CTSB, Mark has held positions as technology coordinator in a public school, as the head of a technology development group for DePaul's School of Music and their Community Music Division, and as a Technical Specialist at Stanford University. Mark has also worked for Apple, Knowledge Networks (New York), Noble Network of Charter Schools (Chicago) and Santa Monica Unified School District.
Mark has researched and developed effective ways to implement technology in K-12 schools and universities with a particular focus on learning management, student information and smart classroom technologies and systems. Mark is excited about the work he is doing as a Systems Administrator at the CTSB, and sidekick for Miriam Davidson (IS Architecture Engineer). Currently he is working on the �Alex Project� virtual peer, and continuing to improve the systems infrastructure of the CTSB. Please remember that all CTSB affiliates have access to Mark's talents, and to the CTSB technological infrastructure, including servers and mobile eye tracking lab.
Research Assistants
Luke Rouser
lrouser at gmail dot com
Luke is a Northwestern graduate who got his BA in classical Greek and modern Italian. Taking some time to focus on writing and working as an activist and sex educator in Chicago, he hopes to somehow channel his interests in minority education and awareness into a career as a librarian. In a cruel mix-up of fate, he is a good student who doesn't like going to school but will probably never leave. He also likes ribbons.
Undergraduate Students
Samuel Cartonsamuelcarton2012 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Angelica Cleveland
jjc at u dot northwestern dot edu
Shiana Crosby
ShianaCrosby2010 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Shiana Crosby is a junior studying Sociology and Anthropology. She works with Kathleen Geraghty on the Alex project.
Matthew Gilk
matthewgilk2012 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Jasmyne McDonald
jmcdonald at u dot northwestern dot edu
Jasmyne McDonald is a sophomore Communication Studies major with a concentration in Business. Her career goals include working for a non-profit organization after graduation and having a a successful freelance writing career. At Northwestern she is a member of House on the Rock- a campus ministry, OASIS -a service oriented student group, and writes for a number of student organizations. In her spare time, she tutors and volunteers at local organizations.
Derek Morris
derekmorris2008 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Katy Witmer
KatherineWitmer2010 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Katy is an undergraduate film major in the School of Comm. She's interested in working in the film or photography industry after she graduates in 2010. Currently she's a member of the Alex Project team.
Alumni
Joaquin (Kino) Aguilar
kino at northwestern dot edu
Kino is a Ph.D. student in the Technology and Social Behavior (TSB) program. His research interests focus on the areas of artificial intelligence and human-computer interaction. He is currently interested in studying rapport and grounding over time. In 2007 he graduated from The University of Texas at El Paso with a B.S. in computer science. More information can be found here.
Miri Arie
miri-arie at northwestern dot edu
Miri Arie was a post-doctoral fellow who worked with Justine Cassell. Miri came to Northwestern from Tel-Aviv University, where she completed a PhD program in clinical child psychology. In addition, she worked as an intern in clinical child psychology at Schneider Children medical center of Isreael, where she acquired a broad experience in psychopathologies and treatment methods.
Miri's interests are studying the development of social skills in children and understanding the psychopathologies related to social skill deficits. Miri's current research focuses on developing a social skills assessment for children using technologically mediated devices. Her previous research and clinical experience includes: selective mutism, high-functioning autism, Asperger's disorder, anxiety, mood-disorders and autobiographical memory. More information can be found at KidsSocialSkills.com.
Rachel Baker
r-baker2 at northwestern dot edu
Rachel is a Ph.D. student in the Linguistics department. She is currently studying how speakers use redundancy when giving directions. Ultimately, this research will be used to improve directions given by the embodied conversational agent NUMACK. Other interests include the prosody-meaning interface and the effects of a word's probability on hypo- and hyper-articulation. In 2003 she received an M.Sc. in Speech and Language Processing at the University of Edinburgh, writing a dissertation on improving prosody in speech synthesizers. In 2001 she graduated from Vassar College with a major in Cognitive Science, focusing in Linguistics. More information can be found here.
Adia Berry
a-berry at northwestern dot edu
Adia majored in Psychology and minored in African-American studies.
John Borland
j-borland at northwestern dot edu
John graduated from Stanford
University in 1995 with a Bachelor of Science in Computer Systems Engineering.
He was awarded a Master of Science in Computer Science from the
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in December 2001, where he participated
in research with Dr. Lui Sha's Quality of Service group and Dr. David Wilkins'
Knowledge Based Systems group. His professional experience includes work in
healthcare, defense, communications and gaming. John served as IS Architecture Engineer for Articulab/CTSB from 2007-2009. He now works in the Human-Level Intelligence Laboratory at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Cathy Breen
c-breen at northwestern dot edu
Cathy majored in Communication Sciences and Disorders.
Kyrsten Brown
kyrstenbrown2007 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Nathan Cantelmo
n-cantelmo at northwestern dot edu
Nathan joined the ArticuLab as a full-time software engineer after graduating from Northwestern with a BS in Computer Science in June 2005. While studying for his degree, he acquired a strong interest in the development of cross-discipline applications for new and emerging technologies. At the ArticuLab, he has been afforded the opportunity to pursue this interest while working on cutting-edge software systems. Nathan's research interests include embedded systems, mobile devices, computer graphics, and real-time systems. He is currently working for Yahoo! in San Francisco, California.
Meg Cramer
megs at northwestern dot edu
Meg Cramer was a Research Assistant at the Articulab. She has a B.S. in Sociology and Radio, Television and Film from Northwestern University('06). She is currently in Rabat, Morocco as a PBS Frontline Fellow to research women's soccer.
Dustin Derby
d-derby at northwestern dot edu
Dustin C. Derby (Ed.D., Northern Illinois University) was the Center for Technology and Social Behavior lab manager from 2006-2007. Derby came to Northwestern after working in higher education as an administrator and a research/statistical consultant. Derby's research focuses on student outcomes in higher education, and specifically understanding how students' background characteristics and college environmental contexts impact learning and enrollment management related outcomes within two- and four-year institutions. More recently, Derby has investigated the impact of self-belief, social, and institutional variables on women's adjustment to the four-year college environment.
Shruti Desai
shruti at u dot northwestern dot edu
Angela Ellington
a-ellington at northwestern dot edu
Angela majored in Communication Studies and minored in Film & Media Studies.
Kim Ferriman
kferriman at northwestern dot edu
Kim was the Research Coordinator and Lab Manager for the Articulab. She has a B.A. in Psychology from Northwestern University ('03), and is currently a Ph.D. student at Vanderbilt University.
Alastair Gill
alastair at northwestern dot edu
Alastair Gill is a Post-Doctoral Fellow working with Justine Cassell and Darren Gergle. His interests are in the social and psychological aspects of communication, especially with reference to computer-mediated technologies which minimise the availability of interpersonal cues. His research focuses on the application of data-intensive techniques to the study of these interpersonal language phenomena. Before coming to the Articulab, he was Faber Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Laboratoire d'Etude de l'Apprentissage et du Developpement (C.N.R.S), University of Burgundy, France. He received his Ph.D. in Informatics from the University of Edinburgh in 2004. More information can be found at:
http://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/agill1/
Courtney Gilliam
CourtneyGilliam2007 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Alberto Gonzalez
albertogonzalez at u dot northwestern dot edu
Berto Gonzalez graduated from Northwestern University in 2007 with a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science. Shortly aftter, he joined the ArticuLab as an IS Architecture Engineer. He was the Technology Coordinator for the Alex Project and lead developer on establishing a Virtual Agent Engine to be used by all Virtual Agent Teams. His interests include Human Computer Interaction, interface design & development, tangible objects as interfaces, and all things Python. www.bertogonzalez.com
Alex Hill
alex-hill at northwestern dot edu
Alex Hill is a post-doctoral fellow specializing in Human Computer Interaction working with Justine Cassell. He received his doctorate while working in the Electronic Visualization Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Chicago. His dissertation topic concerned the development of an integrated development environment for VR worlds that can be used both on the desktop and within the CAVE virtual environment.
In addition to bringing extensive expertise with real-time computer graphics and non-traditional input devices to the CTSB, Alex will be looking into software architectures and markup languages used to develop and deploy virtual peers for interventions regarding Autism and African-American Vernacular English.
www.alexshill.com
Lynne Horey
l-horey at northwestern dot edu
Lynne was the Lab Manager for the ArticuLab from 2007-2008. She received her Masters degree in audiology and hearing science from Northwestern University in June 2007. Lynne has taken her experience in research, organization and healthcare to the UK and is currently a research assistant in the department of orthopaedic surgery at an NHS hospital in Glasgow.
David Huffaker
d-huffaker at northwestern dot edu
David Huffaker was a graduate research assitant in the Articulab. He is currently a Research Fellow at the School of Information at University of Michigan. He completed his doctoral work in the Media, Technology & Society program at Northwestern University in 2009. His research focuses on leadership, expertise, social networks and language use in online groups and communities. Visit http://davehuffaker.com for the latest publications.
Francisco Iacobelli
f-iacobelli at northwestern dot edu
Francisco is a Ph.D. student at the Computer Science department. He got his undergraduate degree in Systems Engineer and Informatics at Universidad Diego Portales in Santiago, Chile . He got his Masters in Computer Science at DePaul University with a concentration in AI. His interests of research include Virtual Peers, intelligent tutoring systems and other aspects of AI applied to the education of children. For more, visit fid punto cl.
Joris Janssen
j-janssen at northwestern dot edu
Joris was a visiting scholar from University of Twente (Enschede, The Netherlands). He got his Bachelors degree in Computer Science and is a graduate student in Human Media Interaction.
His research interests include embodied conversational agents (ECA's),
(non) verbal behavior and multimodal interaction.
Joseph Jorgensen
josephj at northwestern dot edu
Joseph was the ArticuLab's resident systems/software engineer from 2004-2006. He has a B.S. in Computer Science and Cognitive Science from Northwestern University ('04). He is currently working in new media design and development in New York City.
Yoram Kalman
y-kalman at northwestern dot edu
Yoram Kalman is a post-doctoral fellow at the Center for
Technology and Social Behavior. Yoram was previously at The Center for Study of
the Information Society (INFOSOC) at The University of Haifa in Israel, where he wrote
his Ph.D. dissertation on Online Silence. Previously Yoram took his MBA
at Tel Aviv University, following undergraduate and graduate studies in human
genetics at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. During his time in industry,
his latest corporate position was Senior Vice President, Academics, at the
Amsterdam-based Laureate Online Education.
Yoram's dissertation work focused on response latencies in e-mail and in other forms of text-based online communication, and explored the causes and consequences of unresponsiveness in e-mail. His work combines obtrusive and unobtrusive, quantitative and qualitative methodologies. During his post-doctoral research, Yoram examines the way impressions are formed in text-based online communication. He is especially interested in subtle cues used in online communication that are equivalent to nonverbal cues in traditional communication. He also continues his work on the role of time and of silence in online communication, at the individual and organizational level. Lastly, he explores the way 'real world' events and processes affecting people, are reflected in their online writing. Yoram's academic homepage is www.kalmans.com.
Laura Kingsbury
l-kingsbury at northwestern dot edu
Stefan Kopp
skopp at techfak dot uni-bielefeld dot de
Stefan was a postdoctoral research fellow for the Articulab. He is currently an Assistant Professor at Bielefield University. See his personal website for more.
Elizabeth Kozak
ElizabethKozak2007 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Lizzy was a Senior Learning and Organizational Change major with a double major in International Studies.
Tara Latta
t-latta at northwestern dot edu
Tara Latta was the Project Coordinator/Lab Manager for the ArticuLab. She has a B.A. in Psychology and Sociology from Lewis University. Currently, she is the Research Administrator at the Family Institute at Northwestern University.
Alex Markov
a-markov at northwestern dot edu
Alex is a Junior majoring in Communication Studies.
Gabriela Mendieta
g-mendieta at northwestern dot edu
Gabriela majored in Communication Studies.
Julia Merryman
juliamerryman2007 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Audrey Meshulam
a-meshulam at northwestern dot edu
Audrey was Senior Performance Studies major.
Jason Okonofua
jasonokonofua2007 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Jason recently received a bachelors degree for a double major in Psychology and African American Studies from Northwestern University. He is currently applying for PhD programs in social/developmental psychology. In the lab, he serves as a temporary Project Coordinator on the Virtual Peers for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders project and a research assistant for the Junior Research Summit study.
Evelyn Parks
evelynparks2009 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Evelyn is a Junior studing Psychology and African American Studies.
Elonna Pervos
e-pervos at northwestern dot edu
Yolanda Rankin
yrankin at northwestern dot edu
Yolanda was a graduate research assistant for the Articulab. She has a B.S. in Mathematics from Tougaloo College and a M.A. in Computer Science from Kent State University. She is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in Compuer Science at Northwestern University.
Ryan Reid
RyanReid2011 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Ryan Reid is an undergraduate Computer Science major at Northwestern University, also planning on an adjunct major in Animate Arts. He plans on working in the video game design industry after graduating in 2011. He assisted Kino Aguilar on the Lucy Project.
Elisa Revello
e-revello at northwestern dot edu
Elisa was the program assistant in the lab where she performed a variety of tasks. Her professional experience was in marketing, but in the (somewhat distant but) near future, she would like to pursue her master's degree in creative writing.
Marcus Shepard
marcusshepard2008 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Kristina Striegnitz
kris at northwestern dot edu
Kristina was a postdoctoral researcher with the Articulab. She received a joint Ph.D. in computational linguistics from Saarland University (Saarbrücken, Germany) and University Henri Poincaré (Nance, France) in 2004. For more information see her personal homepage.
Rick Swette
r-swette at northwestern dot edu
Rick was a Senior Cognitive Science, Interdepartmental Communications major.
Jared Thebeau
jaredthebeau at hotmail dot com
Jared Thebeau was a Game Design student at Columbia College Chicago. He joined the ArticuLab in 2008 as a Character Design and Animation Consultant. He worked on numerous virtual agent projects, modeling and animating the agents, as well as creating their environments.
Rick van der Werf
r-werf at northwestern dot edu
Taranee Wangsatorntanakhun
taranee at northwestern dot edu
Taranee was the Program Assistant for the ArticuLab until June of 2007. She graduated in 2001 from Barnard College with a BA in American Literature; in 2004 she earned an MA in English from the University of Notre Dame, where she focused on posthuman notions of the body as a text in both real and virtual literature. Currently she is working towards nursing school, and finishing a plethora of knitting projects before her cat shreds them.
Hannah Wells
hannah-wells at northwestern dot edu
Hannah was a Freshman who was interested in studying Computer Science and/or Film.
Jennie Wong
JennieWong2011 at u dot northwestern dot edu
Jennie is a sophomore majoring in Communication Studies. She is working on the Teens and Technology Study with Brooke Foucault.
Michelle Yamada
m-yamada at northwestern dot edu
Michelle came to CTSB from the NU Humanities Institute, where she was an administrator for seven years. She says, "Having a family of technophiles, I am constantly bombarded with the latest video game or gadget at home, as my two teenage sons work to keep me up to date." In her psychology undergrad she began to work on gesture and language acquisition, and found her interests expanded by the various research carried out through CTSB. Michelle worked with CTSB's HR, finance and grant administration.
Debbie Zutty
d-zutty at northwestern dot edu
Debbie Zutty was the Undergraduate Coordinator for the ArticuLab. She graduated from Northwestern with a B.S. in Communication Studies in June 2006. She is interested in social networking and friendship formation among online communities, and worked on the Junior Summit project in the ArticuLab while simultaneously attempting to figure out her plans for the future.
Alexander Zylman
azylman at u dot northwestern dot edu