Recent News

Wisniewski Autism Institute Talk

Wisniewski Autism Institute Talk

"As parents and educators, it is our job to teach Autistic teens these skills, so that they can become well-formed and independent adults. Autistic teens can disproportionately benefit and be harmed online; therefore, it is important to take evidence-based precautions that protect them from harm without limiting their opportunities to...
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Agha Travel Award

Agha Travel Award

Congratulations to STIR lab PhD candidate Zainab Agha for winning the Gary Marsden Travel Awards to attend the CSCW conference. The Gary Marsden Travel Awards support graduate students in attending ACM SIGCHI conferences.
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Dr.Wisniewski and Agha interview

Dr.Wisniewski and Agha interview

“Now it’s not just trying to protect youth online from bad actors who are real people, it’s also trying to understand the types of interactions they are having with these generative AI and open source chat platforms,” Dr. Wisniewski talks to News 2 regarding how AI is adding new complexity...
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Vanderbilt features Akter

Vanderbilt features Akter

Congratulations to Stirlab Ph.D. Student Mamtaj Akter for getting featured by the Vanderbilt School of Engineering for the work on developing community-based app for managing mobile privacy and security. Check out here to learn more.
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Final Teenovate YAB meeting

Final Teenovate YAB meeting

Congrats to StirLab students Naima and Neeraj for wrapping up the final Teenovate YAB meeting. Find more about Teenovate here.
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Wisniewski talks to News2

Wisniewski talks to News2

“We need to be careful to not use social media as our societal scapegoat,” Dr. Wisniewski talks to News2 in lieu of Tennesse school district suing big tech companies like Snapchat and TikTok. Dr. Wisniewski said these platforms also allow marginalized groups like LGBTQ teens and those on the autism spectrum...
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Encode Justice Workshop

Encode Justice Workshop

Congratulations Dr. Wisniewski for presenting at the workshop hosted by Encode Justice Florida and Stand for Freedom to speak to researchers and leaders on why include technology in racial justice and the steps one can take. Watch the full video here.
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Agha Attends IDC

Agha Attends IDC

Congrats to STIR Lab student Zainab Agha for getting accepted into the doctoral consortium at the ACM Interaction Design for Children conference, held in Chicago from June 19-23rd. https://idc.acm.org/2023/ The doctoral consortium is a closed event where accepted Ph.D. students get an opportunity to discuss first results, future plans, stumbling...
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Qadir leads seminar at LIVE

Qadir leads seminar at LIVE

Congratulations Ph.D. Student Sarvech Qadir on conducting a seminar on "Mastering Statistical Analysis and Visualization using JASP" at Vanderbilt LIVE Summer Research Program. In this session, participants learned how to use JASP, a free and open-source statistical software program that can be used to import data from a variety of...
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Agha Awarded LIVE Microgrant

Agha Awarded LIVE Microgrant

Congrats to STIR student Zainab Agha and Dr. Wisniewski on being awarded the LIVE Microgrant of $2000 at Vanderbilt for the Social Media Simulation project! LIVE microgrants are designed to promote faculty and student research on consequential learning technology to help build the LIVE community and support the development of...
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CRA Leadership Academy

CRA Leadership Academy

Congratulations to Dr. Wisniewski for being selected to attend the inaugural CRA Leadership Academy for Faculty (https://cra.org/cra-leadership-academy-for-faculty/). The CRA Leadership Academy cultivates future leaders in computing and computing research through a one-day in-person workshop and follow-up virtual meetings among the Leadership Academy cohort.  Participants will learn new skills and perspectives on leadership,...
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Agha Passes Qualifying Exam

Agha Passes Qualifying Exam

Congratulations to our Ph.D. student Zainab Agha on passing her Qualifying Exam (QE) for Ph.D. in Computer Science at Vanderbilt University. The Qualifying Exam is the second milestone in the Ph.D. program in which the Graduate Committee evaluates the literature review, research progress, and proposed dissertation studies of the student....
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Akter Passes Qualifying Exam

Akter Passes Qualifying Exam

Congratulations to our Ph.D. student Mamtaj Akter on passing her Qualifying Exam (QE) for Ph.D. in Computer Science at Vanderbilt University! The Qualifying Exam is the second milestone in the Ph.D. program in which the Graduate Committee evaluates the literature review, research progress, and proposed dissertation studies of the student....
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Park Presents Paper at WWW

Park Presents Paper at WWW

Congratulations to Dr. Katie Park for presenting her Paper at WWW '23 Companion: Companion Proceedings of the ACM Web Conference 2023. Towards Automated Detection of Risky Images Shared by Youth on Social Media Jinkyung Park, Joshua Gracie, Ashwaq Alsoubai, Gianluca Stringhini, Vivek Singh, Pamela Wisniewski Abstract: With the growing ubiquity...
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Akter’s CHI LBW Paper Accepted

Akter’s CHI LBW Paper Accepted

Congratulations to our Ph.D. Candidate Mamtaj Akter on her CHI LBW paper acceptance. It Takes a Village: A Case for Including Extended Family Members in the Joint Oversight of Family-based Privacy and Security for Mobile Smartphones Mamtaj Akter, Leena Alghamdi, Jess Kropczynski, Heather Lipford, Pamela Wisniewski Abstract: We conducted a...
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Park’s Journal Article Accepted

Park’s Journal Article Accepted

Congratulations to Dr. Jinkyung (Katie) Park on her journal article accepted at the Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 2023 (JFES 2023). How Affordances and Social Norms Shape the Discussion of Harmful Social Media Challenges on Reddit Jinkyung Park, Irina Lediaeva, Maria Lopez, Amy Godfrey, Kapil Chalil Madathil,...
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CHI 2023 Privacy Workshop

CHI 2023 Privacy Workshop

Congratulations to STIR Lab PhD student Zainab Agha on co-organizing an accepted workshop at CHI titled "Privacy Interventions and Education (PIE): Encouraging Privacy Protective Behavioral Change Online". Building on the foundational conversations of previous privacy workshops that identify key privacy issues and consequences, this workshop aims to take privacy research...
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STIR Undergrads Present at VURF

STIR Undergrads Present at VURF

Congratulations to STIR Lab undergraduate students Kelsey Miu and Maria Sophia Piper on presenting their research titled "Co-Designing User Personas and a Simulation for Evaluating Adolescent Online Safety Interventions" at the Vanderbilt Undergraduate Research Fair (VURF), mentored by PhD student Zainab Agha and Jinkyung Park! The Vanderbilt Undergraduate Research Fair provides an...
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