Lorna McKnight

From 2009-2011 Lorna was a Postdoctoral Research Assistant for the ChiCi Group at the University of Central Lancashire, working on the UMSIC project and other research.

My Research Interests

I have a wide range of research interests, which hopefully will lead to a research direction one day. Main areas of interest include HCI and usability, designing and evaluating technology for children, touch-screens and gestures, virtual environments, immersion, augmented reality, tangible interfaces , wearable computing and physicality. My PhD research was on the effect of virtual environments on personal creativity, which also included working extensively with Second Life, and so I have an interest in online social networking tools of this nature, and particularly the effects of interaction in a 3D environment.

Other activities

I have been teaching in Computing at undergraduate and MSc level. Modules I have been involved with this academic year are Computer Skills (1st year undergraduate BSc and FDSc) and Researching People Centred Computing (MSc).

I am also a STEMNET registered STEM Ambassador so frequently take part in activities aimed at increasing young people's engagement with science and technology subjects.

Projects

Publications and Presentations

McKnight, L. and Read, J.C. (2011) PLU-E: A Proposed Framework for Planning and Conducting Evaluation Studies with Children. In Proceedings of BCS-HCI 2011, July 2011. Northumbria, UK. [PDF]

McKnight, L. (2011) Students, Children and Developing Software: The Value of the 'Deep End' in HCI Education. Oral presentation at HCI Educators workshop, part of BCS-HCI 2011, July 2011. Northumbria, UK.

McKnight, L. (2011) Usability and User Experience: A Practical Exploration of Methods for Working with Children. Oral presentation at the 1st International Workshop and Summer School on Mobile Music Technology and Social Inclusion of Young Children, June 2011, University of Oulu, Finland.

McKnight, L. (2011) UMSIC: Addressing Social Inclusion through Mobile Music-Making Software. Oral presentation at CAL 2011, April 2011, Manchester Metropolitan University.

McKnight, L. (2011) Designing for Children with ADHD: The Search for Guidelines for Non-Experts. User Experience, Volume 10, Issue 1. Usability Professionals' Association.

McKnight, L. (2010) Collaborative Design in Second Life: Helping or Hindering the Creative Process? Oral presentation at HCI Educators workshop, part of BCS-HCI 2010, Abertay.

McKnight, L. and Cassidy, B. (2010) Children's Interaction with Mobile Touch-Screen Devices: Experiences and Guidelines for Design. International Journal of Mobile Human Computer Interaction, 2 (2). IGI-Global. [PDF]

McKnight, L. and Fitton, D. (2010) Touch-screen Technology for Children: Giving the Right Instructions and Getting the Right Responses. In Proceedings of IDC 2010, Barcelona, Spain. ACM Press. [PDF]

McKnight, L. (2010) Designing for ADHD: in Search of Guidelines. In the IDC workshop on Digital Technologies and Marginalized Youth. In Proceedings of IDC 2010, Barcelona, Spain. [PDF]

McKnight, L. and J. C. Read (2009). Designing the 'Record' Button: Using Children's Understanding of Icons to Inform the Design of a Musical Interface. In Proceedings of IDC 2009. Como, Italy. ACM Press. [PDF]

Read, J.C., Horton, M., Mazzone, E., Cassidy, B. and McKnight, L. (2009) Designing for Mr Hippo - Introducing Concepts of Marginalisation to Children Designers. In the IDC workshop on Digital Technologies and Marginalized Youth, part of IDC 2009, Como, Italy. [PDF]

McKnight, L. (2009) Exploring Creativity: The Impact of Virtual Environments on the Creative Process. Doctoral thesis, Lancaster University.

McKnight, L. (2007). Instantiating Your Imagination: Creativity Across Different Levels of Reality. In Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Physicality. Lancaster: UWIC Press.

McKnight, L. (2007). Creativity in VR: Constraint versus Exploration. In Proceedings of the 6th ACM SIGCHI conference on Creativity & Cognition. ACM Press.

McKnight, L., Ormerod, T. C., Sas, C., & Dix, A. (2006). As Useful as a Bicycle to a Fish: Exploration versus Constraint in Creativity. In Proceedings of the Cognitive Science Society conference. Montreal, Canada: Cognitive Science Society.

Dix, A., Ormerod, T., Twidale, M., Sas, C., Silva, P. G. da, & McKnight, L. (2006). Why Bad Ideas are a Good Idea. In Proceedings of HCIEd.-1 inventivity. HCI Educators Workshop.