A conversation with Nataly Birbeck

This week I had the pleasure of interviewing Nataly Birbeck about her HCI related motivations and interests. We started by discussing her background and I learned that prior to her arrival at Open Lab she worked as a research assistant in Health and Life Sciences where she participated in a range of projects covering areas including bullying in PE lessons, eSafety and work with the charity Family Fund. Before this she studied for an MSc in Sociological Research. I believe these prior experiences have given her a strong platform from which to explore her current research interests around the topic of mental health and self-harm in particular.

During the short time we have been here Nataly has already found inspiration in some of the participatory design work that goes on within the HCI field. She specifically referenced work that involved co-design for and by people with dementia, and incorporated caregivers and loved ones in the design process. She sees the potential for transferring some of these design techniques to her group of interest – people experiencing mental health challenges. She also sighted loneliness as being an issue that both groups often experience, so there may be room for collaboration here with HCI researchers designing technology that can enhance the bonds between self-harmers and their loved ones, as similar work has already been trialled for people with dementia.

Since coming to the lab she has developed an interest in UbiComp. She finds some of the underpinning ideas rather challenging, asserting that the assumed needs Weiser put forward whilst articulating his ‘calm computing’ vision ought to be questioned. To illustrate this she gave the example of how she enjoys the rather protracted process of making a cup of tea, and she would be very reluctant to allow a machine to take this chore off her hands. This is a position that fans of the Father Ted character Mrs Doyle will easily identify with.

I would like to put Nataly in touch with the Open Lab alumni student Anja Thieme. Anja has done quite a bit of work around creating tangible objects to help vulnerable people and I think Nataly would find her ‘Spheres of Wellbeing’ project very interesting as it used a tangible object to help female prisoners develop mindfulness techniques. I would also recommend Nataly read the paper Toward a virtual assistant for vulnerable users: designing careful interaction by Ramin Yaghoubzadeh and Stefan Kopp. This paper focuses on design considerations that should be kept in mind when creating assistive technologies for a range of vulnerable groups. Given Nataly’s interest in working with vulnerable groups it should be right up Nataly’s street. Similarly I think she should also read Moderated online social therapy: Designing and evaluating technology for mental health by Reeva Lenderman and Greg Wadley which may be very useful for Nataly as it seeks to improve upon the current high attrition rate for web-based mental health applications by offering a range of design guidlines.