Dr Ralf Muhlberger

My key research focus is the conceptualisation of reality, how it affects our use of technologies, and how we can factor this understanding into system design. My background is in Distributed Information Management using integrating technologies such as workflow management systems and peer-to-peer computing, particularly from a modelling perspective. I am now building on that research by looking at engagement models, Affective Computing, and various study and design methods from the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and Computer Support for Collaborative Work (CSCW) fields. The overall goal of this work is to increase the effectiveness of technologies in relation to individual and group goals.

I'm a member of the Interaction Design Research Division, and consider myself both a researcher, and an interaction designer. By design, I understand the process of planning for something ahead of time. Interaction Design (ID) can cover interactions

• between people directly, for example in the form of affordances, processes, providing prior knowledge.
• between people, mediated through technologies to overcome time, space, or other hurdles, for example skype, web forums, mobile phones, translation devices, text-to-speech for voice impaired, hearing aids, etc. This would also include CSCW.
• between people and technology, s.a. HCI.

ID to me is a methodological field, where applying informed design methods in different contexts gives interesting and valuable results to the context, and feeds back into the field of ID by allowing us to evolve our design methods.