
Jan Smeddinck
Visiting Researcher
I am a Visiting Researcher in Digital Health at Open Lab and the School of Computing at Newcastle University in the UK. Prior to this appointment I spent one year as a postdoc visiting research scholar at the International Computer Science Institute (ICSI) in Berkeley and I retain an association with the TZI Digital Media Lab at the University of Bremen in Germany. Building on my background in interaction design, serious games, web technologies, human computing, machine learning, and visual effects, I tend to describe myself as a digital media generalist focusing on human-computer interaction (HCI) research.
My PhD thesis, titled Human-Computer Interaction with Adaptable & Adaptive Motion-based Games for Health, focused on the personalization of exergames designed for use in physiotherapy, rehabilitation, and prevention. It features projects for different target groups, including older adults and people living with Parkinson’s disease.
Cherishing curiosity, cooperation, and exchange I have multiple years of experience of working and studying abroad visiting the USA, Thailand, France, Canada, and England and I have been awarded with long-term fellowships by the ASEM-DUO program, the Klaus Tschira Foundation (KTS), and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). I am also working pro bono as a leading board member at Mooqita.org, a California 501{c}{3} non-profit organization located in Berkeley with the mission of bringing education and work closer together. I am happy to contribute to numerous academic venues as a volunteer organizer and reviewer, including CHI and the IK, and I am a long-term member of multiple professional organizations in computing, including the ACM, GI, and AGI.

Curating Peer Support with Perpetrators of Domestic Violence




Rethinking technologies for domestic violence prevention work



Effects of questionnaires in VR user studies


Examining design choices for questionnaires in VR user studies


Choice-Point: Challenging perpetrators of domestic violence with interactive storytelling




Long-term motivation effects of deep player behavior models for dynamic difficulty adjustment


User perceptions of player substitution with Deep Player Behavior Models


IDEA-FAST: Identifying digital endpoints for fatigue and sleep for people living with chronic conditions


