About Me
I am a design researcher who works on the human-centered vexperience design of personal health technologies. Currently, I am an Assistant Professor at the University of Twente, Interaction Design Research Group. I am passionate about research and design of human-centred technology experiences. I have an Industrial Design academic background.
I have a PhD degree from Middle East Technical University (METU) of Turkey. I worked as a researcher at METU, Department of Industrial Design and Product Usability Testing Unit (UTEST) for several years. I also worked as an assistant professor at TOBB University of Economics and Technology (Ankara, Turkey), where I was granted two TUBITAK (Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey) Research Fundings. During my PhD, I was granted with Fulbright PhD Student Scholarship, and I studied at Carnegie Mellon University, Human-Computer Interaction Institute (USA).
Experience and human-centred design are at the core of my expertise. In my previous empirical works, I worked on the effects of personal health technologies (e.g personal informatics and self-tracking tools) on our behaviour. I explore how interaction design practices could create socially acceptable health behaviour tools and (can) change health behaviour. Currently, I am interested in the roles of (data) interaction design in self-tracking of physical activity and sports. My work combines physiology and psychology with interaction design in understanding and designing meaningful (data) interactions for engagement in physical activity and sports. Recently, I aim to answer the following research questions:
- What are the current user practices of meaningful (data) interactions in personal health technologies?
- How can we transform this knowledge to novel personal health technologies?
- What should be the role of designers in this transformation?
The courses that I’ve been giving mostly focus on human-centred design, interaction design, creativity and design thinking, and design for behaviour change. I am currently contributing to the Industrial Design Engineering at both Bachelor’s and Master’s levels. I am also involved in Creativity and Design Thinking course at Twente Graduate School. I regularly supervise Bachelor’s and Master’s students. In 2021, I received my Senior University Teaching Qualification, for which I developed educational tools for peer-testing in user experience courses.
Expertise
Organisations
Research
We live in a data-driven world, which triggers the way research in health technology is carried out. This fact results in the evolution of digital health technologies which become more and more data-driven and neglects the way people experience their health data. As an expert researcher of experience design, I work on discovering ways to better understand people’s experiences with (digital health) data (see this paper). Meanwhile, I work on developing tools and research projects to make developments in this field more tangible (see this chapter) and long-lasting (see this paper), and contribute to people’s data sensemaking practices.
Currently, I am interested in the roles of (data) interaction design in health and wellbeing, especially in self-tracking of physical activity and sports. My work combines physiology and psychology with interaction design in understanding and designing meaningful (data) interactions for engagement in physical activity and sports.
For more info, please see this video
Publications
UT Research Information System
Google Scholar Link
Education
The courses that I have been giving mostly focus on user-centered design, interaction design, creativity and design thinking, and design for behavior change.
I am currently contributing to Industrial Design Engineering at both Bachelor’s and Master’s levels. I am also involved in the Creativity and Design Thinking course at Twente Graduate School. I regularly supervise Bachelor’s and Master’s students.
Affiliated Study Programmes
Bachelor
Master
Other
Courses Academic Year 2023/2024
Courses Academic Year 2022/2023
Projects
Meaningul User and Data Experiences in Sports, Health and Wellbeing
(Ongoing - Funded partically by Fulbright-USA, Tubitak-Turkey and 4TU-Netherlands)
- Karahanoğlu, A. Psychological Effects of Energy Gels: An investigation into Runners’ Energy Gel Choice and Consumption Strategies in Marathon Running. International Journal of Food Design (Forthcoming)
- Karahanoğlu, A., Gouveia, R., Reenalda, J., & Ludden, G. (2021). How are Sports-Trackers Used by Runners? Running-Related Data, Personal Goals, and Self-Tracking in Running. Sensors 2021, 21, 3687. Open Access https://doi.org/10.3390/s21113687
- Åström, F., Verkade, J., de Kleijn, T. & Karahanoğlu, A. (2021). Self-Tracking and Management of Physical Activity Fluctuations: An Investigation into Seasons, May 2021 CHI 2021 – Human Factors in Computing Systems. https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3411763.3451758
- Karahanoglu, A., van Rompay, T., & Ludden, G. D. (2018). Designing for Lifelong Sports Experience. In Design Research Society 2018: Catalyst (p. 2216). Design Research Society. (link)
- Ludden, G., Ozkaramanli, D., & Karahanoglu, A. (2017). Can you have your cake and eat it too?: A dilemma driven approach to design for the early stages of health behaviour change. In Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Design4Health 2017 (p. 110). Sheffield Hallam University Press. (link)
- Kuru, A. (2016) “I Need That Data: Exploring the Data Experience of Amateur Runners”. The 10th International Conference on Design & Emotion. 27-30 September 2016. (link)
- Kuru, A. (2016) Exploring Experience of Runners with Sports Tracking Technology. International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction, 32(11): p. 847-860. (link)
- Kuru, A. Erbuğ, Ç. (2015) Design for Physical Activity: Design Aspects of Wearable Activity Trackers. In Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Engineering Design (ICED15), Vol. 1: Design For Life DS 80-01, pp 421-432. Milan, Italy, 27.-30 July 2015. (link)
- Kuru, A. Forlizzi, J. (2015) Engaging Experience with Physical Activity Tracking Products. In A. Marcus (Ed.): DUXU 2015, Part I, LNCS 9186, pp. 490–501, 2015. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-20886-2_46 (link)
- Kuru, A., Erbuğ C., Tümer, M. (2013) Creating Awareness Through Personal Informatics Systems: User Expectations Analysis, Tasarım + Kuram, 16, 58-70 (In Turkish)
- Kuru, A & Erbuğ C. (2013) Explorations of Perceived Qualities of On-Body Interactive Products. Ergonomics; 56-6, 906-921.doi: 10.1080/00140139.2013.788737 (link)
Designers’ Perspective on Collecting Longitudinal Data in HCI Studies
Outputs:
- Karahanoğlu, A. & Ludden, G. Imagining the Future of Longitudinal HCI Studies: Sensor-Embedded Everyday Objects as Subjective Data Collection Tools, in Advances in Longitudinal HCI Research Theoretical perspectives, methods, and case studies. Springer, Karapanos E. & Gerken J. (eds). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67322-2_6
Understanding the Impact of “Path to Sustained Usage” Model in Design Process
(Completed - Funded by Tubitak, Turkey)
Outputs:
- Karahanoğlu, A.& Bakırlıoglu, Y. (2020) Evaluation of the Usefulness of Path of Long-Term User Experience Model in Design Process, Behavior and Information Technology. https://doi.org/10.1080/0144929X.2020.1836256
- Karahanoğlu, A., & Bakırlıoğlu, Y. (2017, October). Design for the Next: Integration of Path to Sustained Usage Model into Design Process. In Proceedings of the Conference on Design and Semantics of Form and Movement-Sense and Sensitivity, DeSForM 2017. IntechOpen (link)
- Boğazpınar,H., Bakırlıoğlu,Y., & Kuru,A., Erbuğ,Ç. (2014). Path to Sustained Usage: A Model for Long Term Experience in Technological Products. In Salamanca, J., Desmet, P., Burbano, A., Ludden, G., Maya, J. (Eds.). Proceedings of the Colors of Care: The 9th International Conference on Design & Emotion. Bogotá, October 6-10, 2014. Ediciones Uniandes, Bogotá, 2014. ISBN: 978-958-774-070-7, pg 667-678. (link)
User Experience in Higher Education
(Ongoing – Partically funded by internal funds of University of Twente)
- Karahanoğlu, A. Act Like a User, Work Like a Teacher: Evaluation of Experience Design Works through Peer-Testing.International Journal of Technology and Design Education, published online in November 2021.(link)
- Karahanoğlu A. Were we ready to teach during societal crisis? Lessons learned from a practice-based design engineering course, SEFI (European Society for Enginnering Education) Conference 2021 (Berlin 13-16 September 2021) (link)
- Karahanoglu, A., Oude Alink,C.,Bakirlioglu, Y. (2019) Quantifying Design for User Experience Assignments Using Rubrics as Assessment Tools. Paper presented in DRS LearnX 2019. 9-12 July 2019, Ankara, Turkey. (link)
Designing for People with Dementia: designing for mindful self-empowerment and social engagement (completed)
(Completed - Funded by EU-RISE)
- Niedderer, K., Holthoff-Detto, V., van Rompay, T. J. L., Karahanoğlu, A., Ludden, G. D. S., Almeida, R., . . . Tournier, I. (2022). This is Me: Evaluation of a boardgame to promote social engagement, wellbeing and agency in people with dementia through mindful life-storytelling. Journal of Aging Studies, 60, 100995. Open Access https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaging.2021.100995
- Gosling, J., et. al. (2019). The AIR model (Activities, Internal world, Relationships): a pragmatic framework for evaluating co-design.
Media
- https://player.vimeo.com/video/705750606?h=95a309c85b
In the press
- https://www.utoday.nl/campus-life/64391/you-dont-know-what-they-know
- https://www.utoday.nl/science/69067/social-distancing-can-be-fun-with-the-right-design
Contact Details
Visiting Address
University of Twente
Faculty of Engineering Technology
Horst Complex
(building no. 20), room W254
De Horst 2
7522LW Enschede
The Netherlands
Mailing Address
University of Twente
Faculty of Engineering Technology
Horst Complex
W254
P.O. Box 217
7500 AE Enschede
The Netherlands