Hi Everyone, I wanted to share this info with you:

“I am forwarding the following information about the SJSU
Psychology Department’s Spartan Psychological Association Research
Conference (SPARC) because I thought our keynote speaker may be of interest
to students in your Human Factors program.

SPARC is a research conference which gives undergraduate and graduate
students an opportunity to present their psychological research in talks and
poster sessions.  Each year we also have a keynote speaker.

Our featured speaker this year is Dr. David C. Foyle, who is a SJSU alumnus.
Dr. Foyle is currently a Senior Research Psychologist in the Human Factors
Research & Technology Division at the NASA Ames Research Center.  Below is
his talk title and date/time.  I’ve also attached an announcement and
schedule for SPARC.

Title:  Aviation Human Factors Research: Designing Human-Centere Systems
Date & Time: Tuesday, April 21, 3:00 – 4:00, LomaPrieta Ballroom

More information about SPARC and Dr. Foyle can be found at the following
site:

http://www.sjsu.edu/psych/sparc/

We hope to see some of your students at the conference!

Sincerely,

Clifton Oyamot, Ph. D.
Faculty Adviser, SPARC
Assistant Professor
Department of Psychology
San Jose State University
San Jose, CA 95192-0120

408-924-5650
Clifton.Oyamot@sjsu.edu ”

SJSU HFES has arranged a tour of Paypal. We will be visiting their newly constructed usability labs, as well as their eye tracking lab. The manager of User Experience, Kuldeep Kelkar, will be showing us around and he will also be giving a short talk on the Day in the Life of a UX Professional. You will also have a chance to ask him any questions that you might have about the field of UX. This is a members only event.

Hope to see you there!
Jamie Miller
Events Coordinator

Dr. Jordan will be speaking next Wednesday, March 4th at 7 p.m. in ENG 486. The chapter will be providing turkey sandwiches, chips, and water. If you need a vegetarian option, please email me. The event is open to all students.

If you’re a member, please RSVP to the Evite. If you’re a non-member and wish to attend, please RSVP to me by this Sunday at 9 p.m.

The topic of the evening will be as follows:

Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen): SJSU Participation in Meeting the Aeronautics Challenge

Dr. Kevin Jordan of the Department of Psychology at SJSU will present an overview of work being done on a series of research agreements that he directs at the NASA Ames Research Center. One major focus of his team’s current work involves supporting the near term NextGen requirements for increased capacity, increased safety, and a reduced impact of air transportation on the environment. Since this system will be asked to do more that it does currently, and since roles and responsibilities will change in this future system, we are working to develop decision-support tools for pilots and air-traffic controllers. Dr. Jordan will describe ongoing work that involves developing an air-side (flight deck) Cockpit Situation Display and ground-side merging and spacing algorithms.

Biography of Dr. Jordan:

Dr. Jordan is a Professor of Psychology at SJSU. He has been at San Jose State since 1984 and currently teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in visual perception. Dr. Jordan received his Ph.D. in Psychology from Kansas State University in 1982. As Project Director of numerous cooperative agreements between San Jose State University and the Human Systems Integration Division at the NASA Ames Research Center, Dr. Jordan has authored proposals resulting in over $95 million in funding to support collaborative research in aerospace human factors. He has published in the areas of visual illusions and aftereffects, size constancy, and the perception of misoriented stimuli. Dr. Jordan’s current human factors research interests involve studying size and distance perception in virtual environments and visual attentional issues in the use of head-up displays. Dr. Jordan received the NASA Public Service Medal in 1992. He was named the 1995-1996 Outstanding Professor at San Jose State University and in 2001, he was named Outstanding Teacher by the Western Psychological Association.

Hope to see you there!
Jamie Miller
Events Coordinator

A quick reminder, tomorrow evening (Tuesday the 10th at 7:30 PM) is the monthly BayCHI meeting. Meetings are at PARC in Palo Alto and are open to the public (membership is not required). From the program guide:

Getting People to Talk to an Animal: Lessons Learned Designing Aardvark

Rob Spiro, The Mechanical Zoo

For the past year Rob and the team at The Mechanical Zoo have been designing Aardvark, a new Social Search product primarily used through IM and email. Rob will talk about some of the challenges faced and lessons learned during the past year of product design, including:

• Heuristics for a successful conversational interface.
• Sensitivities to different channels (web, IM, email and mMobile) and unifying a multi-channel experience.
• Obstacles faced in introducing a new search user experience.
• Strengths and weaknesses of various research methods.
• Incorporating user-centered design into an agile engineering process.

More information, directions, etc are available on the BayCHI website: http://www.baychi.org/program/