Author: Hazel

Existing research has shown that the Internet can have significant impacts on wellbeing in the workplace, for instance, constantly being connected to digital devices can reduce wellbeing, as can exposure to negative online content or interactions. Meanwhile, Internet-enabled technologies can sometimes be effective interventions to increase wellbeing. This project will conduct a set of research activities involving a wide range of workplaces and job roles to better understand dimensions of wellbeing in the workplace. Work will involve the co-designing and testing of novel technological interventions to foster wellbeing and produce guidance on different potential approaches to manage and mitigate the impact of a hyper-connected work environment.    

W-WATI is led by Horizon Assistant Professor Helena Webb, an experienced interdisciplinary researcher working at the intersection of society and technology. Joining Helena is Kai Xu, an Associate Professor in the School of Computer Science and co-director of the Visualisation Research Group. Kai’s expertise is around the development of interactive visual interfaces to enable public and domain experts working with AI and machine learning to tackle challenging problems.  Emma McClaughlin is a Research Fellow in the School of English with expertise in corpus linguistics and discourse analysis. Emma’s work focusses on health literacies and the reception and production of public health communication. Liz Dowthwaite is a Senior Research Fellow, with expertise in social and cyberpsychology, focused on technology-mediated interaction and theories of human values and wellbeing.   

Also in the team are Pepita Barnard, Research Fellow with domain expertise in human factors, NHS services, mental health, health technologies, trust and wellbeing.  Peter Craigon, Research Fellow with an interest and expertise in responsible innovation and the development of tools to support engagement with issues of responsibility.  Elizabeth March, a researcher experienced in the digital workplace industry, Karen Lancaster, Research Fellow in Human Factors Engineering with a background of interdisciplinary research, Virginia Portillo, Research Fellow and EDI Coordinator at RAi UK, Praminda Caleb-Solly, Professor of Embodied Intelligence with experience in co-designing and testing digital technologies in health and social care.  Alby Magassouba, Assistant Professor in Robotics and AI, Harriet Cameron, Early Career Researcher and Neelima Sailaja, Horizon Assistant Professor, also join the team and bring a wealth of knowledge spanning multimodal embodied AI for language understanding in the context of domestic service robots, ethical and sustainable technologies within public environments and the sociotechnical implications of cutting-edge technology. 

A toolkit to guide the use of immersive and emerging technologies to support the mental health of people in the community and voluntary sector.

Many different technologies can be used for mental health treatment and support, including immersive and emerging technologies – virtual reality and artificial intelligence – which many people are not familiar with. The HAWT Toolkit project will develop the Horizon Adoption of Wellbeing Technologies (HAWT) Toolkit to help organisations evaluate and implement these tools safely and effectively. The Toolkit will be co-developed with community and voluntary organisations that work with people who may benefit from these technologies and who are interested in adopting them, as well as experts from across disciplines, such as law and medicine.

The project focuses on digital mental health (DMH) – defined as including numerous types of technologies -from smartphones to extended reality systems – for mental health diagnosis, treatment, prevention, intervention, support and can be provided by a trained deliverer or direct to consumer.

HAWT Toolkit is led by Aislinn Gomez Bergin, a Transitional Assistant Professor with RAi UK. Aislinn has a rich background of research in digital mental health spanning development, evaluation and implementation activities and leads the i-Emerge project which engages the community and voluntary sector in emerging immersive technologies and how they can be used to effectively support the mental health and wellbeing of people in Nottingham.

Joining the project are Emily Thorn, Chris Greenhalgh and Sachiyo Ito-Jaeger – who are all also working on our Soma Co-designing project. Peter Craigon, a Research Fellow with interdisciplinary research experience and an interest in responsible innovation and the development of tools to support engagement with issues of responsibility. Elvira Perez Vallejos, Horizon Co-Investigator and Professor of Mental Health and Technology, brings a vast wealth of knowledge in this area and is interested in providing specific case studies on DeathTech and other new technologies for mental health, including grieving and end-of-life.  Natalie Leesakul is an Assistant Professor in Law and Autonomous Systems with an interest in the regulation guidelines and best practices for the responsible adoption of new technologies. Finally, Anna-Maria Piskopani, a Research Fellow in IT Law joins the team, having worked in numerous interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary projects, her research interests are in human rights protection in emerging technologies ecosystems