Leon Watts

I am a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Bath. I research Computer-Supported Collaborative Work and Human-Robot Interaction, focusing on the analysis and design of interactive systems as they serve to help people appreciate and understand one another's concerns. My work puts people and their feelings right at the centre of interaction design problems, including in choreography as a form of embodied expression, political discussion, chronic health, cognitive rehabilitation, or the coordination of work in physical settings. 

Interactive technologies routinely mediate between people: we are able to understand, or may be put at odds with one another, by virtue of the structures and processes embedded in the technologies we use. Technologically mediated interactions frame 'social cognition'; how people perceive one another as social agents, how social actions are interpreted, and how social situations are understood. Interactive systems can have this effect because they ampilfy some aspects of human behaviour, hide others and also open up new ways of acting that have no natural analogue. So interactive systems impose themselves on human relationships and have become a key part of human experience. If they are to work well, interactive systems must assist people to express themselves and also help show whether or not they recognise the feelings of others.