Presenter

Professor Leanne Hirshfield is an Associate Research Professor in the Institute of Cognitive Science at University of Colorado, Boulder. Hirshfield directs the System Human Interaction with NIRS and EEG (SHINE) Lab at the University of Colorado. She is also on the leadership team for the NSF AI Institute on Student AI Teaming (iSAT), where she directs human-computer interaction (HCI) research focused on the design, implementation, and evaluation of AI Partners to support group collaboration in classrooms. Hirshfield is also PI on a Multi-University Research Initiative through AFOSR that focuses on supporting individuals and teams to maintain ‘cognitive security’ in both high and low information density environments. Hirshfield’s SHINE Lab research explores the use of non-invasive neurophysiological measurement (e.g., fNIRS, EEG, eyetracking, heartrate) to passively classify users’ social, cognitive, and affective states in order to enhance usability testing and adaptive system design, with a focus on human performance and human-agent teaming. In particular, Hirshfield has extensive experience using brain measurement to measure states relating to trust, team cohesion, negative affect, and cognitive load. She works primarily with functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), a relatively new non-invasive brain imaging device that is safe, portable, robust to noise, and can be implemented wirelessly; making it ideal for research in human-computer interaction.