Elizabeth Churchill

Term of Service on the CCC Council: 2017 – 2018

Currently a Director of User Experience at Google, Dr. Elizabeth Churchill is an applied social scientist working in the area of human computer interaction, computer mediated communication, mobile/ubiquitous computing and social media. Her most recent research focuses on design systems and frameworks.

Originally a psychologist by training, throughout her career Elizabeth has focused on understanding people’s social and collaborative interactions in their everyday digital and physical contexts. She has studied, designed and collaborated in creating online collaboration tools (e.g. virtual worlds, collaboration/chat spaces), applications and services for mobile and personal devices, and media installations in public spaces for distributed collaboration and communication. In addition to being instrumental in the creation of innovative technologies, she has contributed to academic research through her publications in theoretical and applied psychology, cognitive science, human-computer interaction, mobile and ubiquitous computing, and computer supported cooperative work. She has published over 150 peer-reviewed publications, written two co-authored volumes (Foundations for Designing User Centered Systems with Frank Ritter and Gordon Baxter, and Designing with Data with Rochelle King and Caitlin Tan), and has co-edited 5 books. Topics she has written about include implicit learning, human-agent systems, mixed initiative dialogue systems, social aspects of information seeking, digital archive and memory, value sensitive design, feminism and design, AI & agent-based collaborative technologies, frameworks for human-centered systems design and the development of emplaced media spaces. In addition to serving on advisory boards for a number of university departments, she is the current secretary/treasurer of the Association for Computing Machinery.