Meredith M. Skeels

When social networks cross boundaries: a case study of workplace use of facebook and linkedin

The use of social networking software by professionals is increasing dramatically. How it is used, whether it enhances or reduces productivity, and how enterprise-friendly design and use might evolve are open questions. We examine attitudes and behaviors in a large, technologically-savvy organization through a broad survey and thirty focused interviews. We find extensive social and work uses, with complex patterns that differ with software system and networker age. Tensions arise when use spans social groups and the organizations firewall. Although use is predominantly to support weak ties whose contribution to productivity can be difficult to prove, we anticipate rapid uptake of social networking technology by organizations.

Personal health information management

Integrating personal health information helps people manage their lives and actively participate in their own health care.

Catalyzing social support for breast cancer patients

Social support is a critical, yet underutilized resource when undergoing cancer care. Underutilization occurs in two conditions: (a) when patients fail to seek out information, material assistance, and emotional support from family and friends or (b) when family and friends fail to meet the individualized needs and preferences of patients. Social networks are most effective when kept up to date on the patients status, yet updating everyone takes effort that patients cannot always put in. To improve this situation, we describe the results of our participatory design activities with breast cancer patients. During this process, we uncovered the information a social network needs to stay informed as well as a host of barriers to social support that technology could help break down. Our resulting prototype, built using Facebook Connect, includes explicit features to reduce these barriers and thus, promote the healthy outcomes associated with strong social support.

Digital memories in an era of ubiquitous computing and abundant storage

A lifetime of digital memories is possible but raises many social, as well as technological, questions.

Revealing uncertainty for information visualization

Uncertainty in data occurs in domains ranging from natural science to medicine to computer science. By developing ways to include uncertainty in our information visualizations we can provide more accurate visual depictions of critical datasets. One hindrance to visualizing uncertainty is that we must first understand what uncertainty is and how it is expressed by users. We reviewed existing work from several domains on uncertainty and conducted qualitative interviews with 18 people from diverse domains who self-identified as working with uncertainty. We created a classification of uncertainty representing commonalities in uncertainty across domains and that will be useful for developing appropriate visualizations of uncertainty.

Identifying opportunities for inpatient-centric technology

The evolution from a disease-centered model of care to a more patient-centered model presents opportunities for going beyond designing technology to support medical professionals to encompass supporting patients as well. In this work, we conducted interviews with 16 inpatients and 5 visitors in several hospital wards to uncover opportunities for improving the inpatient experience. Findings suggest that a redesign of the call button system could improve nurse-patient communication and relieve anxiety. Providing information about overall progress and upcoming events could help patients maintain a sense of autonomy in a disempowering environment. Helping patients learn more about their health through information access could lead to a greater sense of ownership over health. Technology promoting social connectedness could help patients virtually escape the isolating hospital environment. Finally, novel interaction techniques could make technology more accessible to this unique population.

Bringing the field into focus: user-centered design of a patient expertise locator

Managing personal aspects of health is challenging for many patients, particularly those facing a serious condition such as cancer. Finding experienced patients, who can share their knowledge from managing a similar health situation, is of tremendous value. Users of health-related social software form a large base of such knowledge, yet these tools often lack features needed to locate peers with expertise. Informed directly by our field work with breast cancer patients, we designed a patient expertise locator for users of online health communities. Using feedback from two focus groups with breast cancer survivors, we took our design through two iterations. Focus groups concluded that expertise locating features proved useful for extending social software. They guided design enhancements by suggesting granular user control through (1) multiple mechanisms to identify expertise, (2) detailed user profiles to select expertise, and (3) varied collaboration levels. Our user-centered approach links field work to design through close collaboration with patients. By illustrating trade-offs made when sharing sensitive health information, our findings inform the incorporation of expertise locating features into social software for patients.