As an undergraduate in summer 2018, Olivia conducted a home deployment of digital assistants, in-home interviews with families, content analysis of online reviews, and a national parent survey to understand how families use and perceive digital assistants, such as Amazon Alexa. She collaborated with researchers at the University of Washington as part of the Computing Research Association’s Distributed REU program.

This research illuminated families perspectives, needs, and experiences with communication breakdowns with Alexa.

This paper was presented at the 2019 Conference on Human Computer Interaction (CHI) in Glasgow, UK (link) and in the Ubiquitous Computing journal (link). Olivia was selected to present her independent research at the 2018 Grace Hopper Celebration in Houston, TX and at the CHI 2019 Student Research Competition, as well.