Dr. Randall Engle was awarded a grant from the Office of Naval Research (ONR) to develop an assessment battery for Navy SEALs. This battery will be administered in all the venues in which SEALs work so it will be implemented on mobile devices such as the iPhone. The goal of this grant is to develop and test a battery of fluid intelligence and working memory capacity tasks that would be accessible to researchers and participants over the web. Kenny Hicks and Jeff Foster, members of Dr. Engle’s Attention and Working Memory Lab, have taken the first step toward creating a reliable web- based cognitive testing tool using the programming language Real Studio. Real Studio does not require researchers to purchase licenses, is compatible with Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems, and can be hosted on the web or potentially on a desktop computer in a recruiter’s field office.

Jenay Beer, graduate student in the School of Psychology, gave a TED talk at the TEDxGeorgiaTech event in April 2012. The TEDx talk covered a multi-disciplinary research group investigating the use of the PR2 robotto help older adults age-in-place. The research group is led by Dr. Wendy Rogers from the School of Psychology, and Dr. Charlie Kemp from Biomedical Engineering.

Dr. Bruce Walker was awarded a grant from ESPN (in partnership with Georgia Tech's GVU Center) entitled "Making Fantasy Football More Accessible and Engaging Via Multimodal Interaction". As part of ESPN’s corporate mission “To serve sports fans. Anytime. Anywhere.” features such as fantasy football help to keep fans connected and immersed throughout the NFL season. Although this feature is highly enjoyable and engaging for sighted users, it is largely not accessible to visually impaired or print-disabled users. Walker's project involves the development of advanced auditory and multimodal displays of team and player stats, to make ESPN’s fantasy football accessible and enjoyable for the many visually impaired sports fans. At the same time, this offers a unique way to increase the enjoyment of current users by providing a more immersive multi-sensory environment through the use of auditory information along with the visual data that is currently displayed.

Dr. Bruce Walker was awarded an NSF grant entitled "Multimodal Technology Tools for Universal Access to STEM Education under the Common Core Curriculum". Given the importance of interpreting data, educators have made the teaching of graph concepts a core component of primary and secondary mathematics education. Unfortunately, the visual nature of a typical number line or graph presents a major disability for those with visual impairment. The core purpose of Walker's NSF project is to develop software tools that make STEM education more accessible, and to ensure that those tools are based on scientific foundations and are empirically evaluated and validated in real classroom learning settings. The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent federal agency created by Congress in 1950 "to promote the progress of science; to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare; to secure the national defense…" Walker's overarching goal is to ensure that technology is developed with the end user in mind. All aspects design, implementation, adoption, and use of a system or device can be enhanced by considering the perceptual, cognitive, and social needs and abilities of those who will use it.

Most recent NSF Grant:
HCC: Small: Multimodal Technology Tools for Universal Access to STEM Education Under the Common Core Curriculum
Agency: NSF (National Science Foundation)

Dr. Frank Durso and the Cognitive Ergonomics Lab Partnering with CSX Rail

1st Place - Snow White - (Electric Slide Dancing) Trained by Austin and Jade
2nd Place - Nessie (Ballroom Dance) - Trained by Tyler and Dakota
3rd Place - Hobart (Go through Hoops) - Trained by Alex and Cristina