TICTAC investigates research topics that can lead to a more inclusive and equal digital society by focusing on creating future digital technology-based landscapes to help children reach their full potential.
Our research aims to allow children to be more proactive citizens of a digital society by challenging unconscious biases perpetrated throughout society, and by lowering barriers to education and digital resources. The group will achieve this by designing and implementing technology-based experiences that develop a sense of awareness and critical stance in children to become activists in shaping their digital society.
We focus on three main lenses and applications domains:
- Inequalities, e.g. detecting and mitigating the social biases spread within digital technology, AI/ML
- Education, e.g. empowering kids to create digital devices
- Ecology, e.g. reconnecting children to biodiversity and facilitating their understanding of the technology’s impact on the environment and living communities
TICTAC has the purpose of creating a process in which children as active agents will be engaged in an open dialogue with the scientific community, society, industry and policymakers.
TICTAC aims at creating ground-breaking research in Child-Computer Interaction to generate new knowledge for improving the UK’s capability to face and resolve digital societal challenges. We will focus on local areas (e.g. Lancashire) as well as other areas both in the UK and worldwide. Considering the specific purpose of the group to have a societal impact on the community we focus on the marginalised areas in Lancashire and the Northwest of England. This specific focus in those areas will fit our goal of facing inequalities.
Our group promote research based on diversity, inclusion, and equity values and will address research issues by following an ethical approach in which children are protected, informed, engaged and never exploited.
This will be achieved by developing methodological approaches that include and respect children’s voices in any regard and form as digital consumers and producers. We will mainly use critical thinking-based and participatory design approaches that allow children to have a direct hands-on experience on the topics and with the technology.
The group will draw on a range of methodological and analytical techniques, including co-design, speculative design, and critical thinking can be applied to investigate specific research issues, and we also value methods based on technology hands-on and field case studies. We apply techniques that include children as part of the process and empower their voices throughout the research. Thus, TICTAC will make a contribution to methodological knowledge by shaping these according to the context and the aim of the research e.g. a fairer engagement of the stakeholders, to improve data collection and analysis.