We are delighted to learn that Soon Hau Chua (Previous lab member, PhD alumnus) and his co-authors have been accepted to the prestigious CSCW 2018 for their paper “Korero: Facilitating Complex Referencing of Visual Materials in Asynchronous Discussion Interface”. Korero is a system that improves online discussion forums by enabling convenient referencing of multiple and specific referents (i.e., text and video resources) within discussion threads. MOOCs and other large-scale online learning substrates rely heavily on discussion forums as the primary social/collaborative mechanism, making this topic highly relevant.

The paper was especially praised for its principled design justification and user study that shows Korero’s efficacy when put into the hands of real users. It will also be featured in the inaugural issue of the Proceedings of ACM: Human Computer Interaction (PACM) in November 2017. Congratulations for the great work!

Abstract:

In asynchronous online discussion, users actively reference visual materials (e.g., video, document) to provide supporting evidence and additional context. However, creating and comprehending complex references can be challenging, especially when there are multiple referents to refer, or when a referent is highly specific (e.g., specific sentences in a paper rather than the paper as a whole). To identify users’ challenges in making references with multiple and specific referents while using existing discussion tools, we conducted an observational study and a preliminary interview. Based on the design lessons, we built Korero, a discussion interface that aims to facilitate complex referencing actions. For evaluation, we compared Korero against conventional interfaces in two user studies with referencing tasks of different referential difficulty. We found that Korero not only significantly reduces the time and effort in making references with multiple and specific referents, but also shows potential in increasing users’ engagement with the discussion and referent materials.

Citation:

Soon Hau Chua, Toni-Jan Keith Monserrat, Dongwook Yoon, Juho Kim and Shengdong Zhao. 2017. Korero: Facilitating Complex Referencing of Visual Materials in Asynchronous Discussion Interface. Proc. ACM Hum.-Comput. Interact. 1, 34. 1 (January 2017), 18 pages. Also part of the proceedings of ACM CSCW 2018 (to appear). DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3134669

For more information about “Korero”, you may contact Dr. Soon Hau Chua.