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Bruckman, Amy S.

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Publication Search Results

Now showing 1 - 9 of 9
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    Designing for Civil Conversations: Lessons Learned from ChangeMyView
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2017-12-12) Jhaver, Shagun ; Vora, Pranil ; Bruckman, Amy S.
    Research has shown that people all over the world, and particularly Americans, are divided over many issues – from immigration and gun control to economic and foreign policy. Information bubbles further contribute to these divisions: People prefer to consume content they feel familiar with and see views they agree with. Yet, pluralism and viewpoint diversity are necessary for a well-functioning democracy. In this paper, we explore how we can design interfaces that dial down partisan antipathy and allow users with opposing viewpoints to understand one another. We study ChangeMyView (CMV) subreddit, a community that encourages users to change their opinion by inviting reasoned counterarguments from other members. We use interviews with 15 CMV members to gain insights about the design mechanisms and social norms that allow this community to function well. We also explore how we can replicate such civil interactions between users with different ideologies on other platforms.
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    Deliberate Barriers to User Participation on MetaFilter
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2014) Pileggi, Hannah ; Morrison, Briana ; Bruckman, Amy S.
    This descriptive study explores deliberate barriers to user participation on the long-lived discussion site Metafilter.com. Metafilter has been in continuous operation since its founding in 1999, and at the time of this writing has around 12,000 active users. While many newer online sites appear eager to eliminate barriers to participation and recruit as many new members as possible, Metafilter charges a $5 fee to join and has a mandatory one-week waiting period before new users are allowed to post. In this paper, we explore both why these barriers were imposed and why some users choose to surmount the barriers to become members. Our data sources include historical documents posted on the site, interviews with eleven site members, an informal user survey, and an interview with the Matt Haughey, the site’s founder and owner. Implications of these design features are discussed.
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    Georgia Computes! Summer Computer Camps Survey Results
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2012) Guzdial, Mark ; Ericson, Barbara ; Bruckman, Amy S. ; Yardi, Sarita ; Hewner, Michael ; Dimond, Jill ; DiSalvo, Betsy ; Lijun, Ni ; Benda, Klara ; McKlin, Tom
    Summer camps are a popular form of outreach for colleges and universities. But, it is not enough to offer computing summer camps and hope that students like them. The camps should be effective by some measure, such as broadening participation by underrepresented groups and/or increasing learning. Summer camps should also be financially sustainable, so that institutions can continue to offer them regularly. The summer camps at Georgia Tech have become effective and financially sustainable. This dataset reports on the evaluation results from Georgia Tech summer camps, as well as seven other colleges and universities in Georgia that offered computing summer camps during the summer of 2012 with assistance from Georgia Tech.
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    ITR collaborative research: Indexing, retrieval, and use of large motion databases
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009-02-25) Bruckman, Amy S.
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    Web Science & Online Communities
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008-01-23) Bruckman, Amy S.
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    The Effects of Conversations with Regulars and Administrators on the Participation of New Users in a Virtual Learning Community
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2007) Medynskiy, Yevgeniy (Eugene) ; Bruckman, Amy S.
    Recent interest in synchronous collaborative learning environments prompts an examination of users' participation, social roles, and social interactions in these spaces. We analyze new users' participation rates on MOOSE Crossing, a collaborative educational environment that has been operating for over ten years. We examine how interactions with MOOSE Crossing regulars - highly active users who set the tone for the community - and its administrators, may influence the participation of new users. New users who conversed with regulars or administrators soon after joining are found to exhibit more social activity and stay involved with MOOSE Crossing longer than new users who did not. Regulars are apparently better at eliciting participation than administrators, but a synergistic effect is also detected - new users who interacted with both administrators and regulars exhibit especially high rates of participation.
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    Social and Technical Factors Contributing to Successful 3D Animation Authoring by Kids
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2006) Zagal, José Pablo ; Piper, Anne Marie ; Bruckman, Amy S.
    Creating 3D animations has traditionally been restricted to adult experts. With the advent of easy-to-use software packages like Alice, we can now imagine animations being created by end users with no formal training in this area. Does this work in practice? Supporting real people in the successful use of complex multimedia authoring environments requires not only quality software, but also a supportive social context. What might such a supportive social context look like? In this paper, we report on a workshop in which seventeen children ages 11-12, working in pairs, were asked to make their own animations using Alice. Students were part of a language arts class studying fables, and were asked to retell a fable of their choice in 3D animation. This assignment proved to be an appropriate size and scope for the time available, skills of the students, and affordances of the software. The students found the assignment motivating, and their teacher was pleased with learning outcomes. We discuss social and technical factors that helped students create successful animated fables.
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    Kids Telling Fables Through 3D Animation
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2004) Zagal, José Pablo ; Piper, Anne Marie ; Bruckman, Amy S.
    Creating 3D animations has traditionally been restricted to adult experts. With the advent of easy-to-use software packages like Alice, we can now imagine animations being created by end users with no formal training in this area. Does this work in practice? Supporting real people in the successful use of complex multimedia authoring environments requires not only quality software, but also a supportive social context. What might such a supportive social context look like? In this paper, we report on a workshop in which seventeen children ages 11-12, working in pairs, were asked to make their own animations using Alice. Students were part of a language arts class studying fables, and were asked to retell a fable of their choice in 3D animation. This assignment proved to be an appropriate size and scope for the time available, skills of the students, and affordances of the software. The students found the assignment motivating, and their teacher was pleased with learning outcomes. We discuss social and technical factors that helped students create successful animated fables.
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    Audience in Computer Learning: A Constructionist Interpretation
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2004) Hayes, Gillian Rachael ; Piper, Anne Marie ; Amar, Robert Anthony ; Bevis, Korin J. ; Newstetter, Wendy C. ; Bruckman, Amy S.
    Adolescents often anticipate the reactions of other people in social situations. We believe this construction of imaginary audiences serves as a stimulant to youth engagement in activities and their abilities to become proficient in the use of technology. In this paper, we examine the role of audience at one Intel Computer Clubhouse, a radical constructionist learning environment.