Design Workshop Information

Design Workshop for KOALA Hero

Thanks you for taking an interest in the KOALA project. We are researchers from the Department of Computer Science at the University of Oxford. Our goal is to develop technology solutions to support parents helping their primary school children learn more about risks related to the use of mobile devices.

This March, we are launching a series of 1.5-hour design workshops and would like to invite you and your child to be part of it. Co-design is an approach we use to foster more collective creativity amongst participants throughout a design process. It often involves lots of fun activities and interactions.

What are we trying to find out?

Existing research has shown that both parents and children would value a mechanism that would enable more involvement of parents in mediating children’s use of mobile technologies and their online safety. However, such a tool is still a scarcity in the existing market.

This co-design workshops with families aim to find out how parents would like to be supported to mediate their children’s choice of mobile apps so that to reduce their online personal privacy risks. We aim to find out

1. What types of information about the mobile apps parents would find most useful?

2. What kind of knowledge scaffolding mechanism or information delivery mechanism would parents prefer?

Who can participate?

We are interested to invite parents/guardians with at least one child that is aged between 6 and 10 years old, who has regular access to a tablet computer or mobile device, for over 4 hours per week. We are inviting ~6-8 families to take part in our study.

What will happen if I take part?

On the day of the study, you and your child will be asked to bring along your child’s usual tablet device from home.

1. To start, we will spend about 10 minutes to have a "sharing" session, about what your family enjoy doing on the tablets and how you choose apps for your children.

2. Then we are going to carry out two 30-minute design activities. At each activity, you are going to be presented with a different type of technology that can help you carry out the task of managing mobile apps used by your children.

3. At the end of each design activity, we will give you some fun post-its, to reflect on what works for you and what could work better, in a kind of game format.

4. We will complete the design workshop by moving these post-its around and group them in a way that will make sense to everyone, and it will be something amazing!

The workshop will be facilitated by Dr Jun Zhao, along with an external app design consultant or a research assistant. You may also be asked to participate in a follow-up filed study later this year, though participation in this is optional.

An audio and video recording will be taken during the interview. Both will be transcribed in order to facilitate our data analysis, with all personally identifiable information (such as names or home addresses) being removed. The recordings will then be deleted. The video recording is collected because it will capture important interaction information between parents and children that cannot be captured by audio or notes. We will also collect some demographic information about you (such as your age, education level, job status, number of children etc) and your child (such as their age, their typical hours of usage of tablets, their favourite apps and etc). All data collected in the study will be kept secure and confidential as specified below. You will be provided a consent form to complete before joining in the study.

What are the possible disadvantages of taking part?

There are no known risks to take part in the study. We will have mechanisms in place to ensure that information collected during the study will be kept anonymous, and not disclosed to anyone besides named above. If any risks become known during the research, you will be informed straight away.

What are the advantages of taking part?

We hope this study will help you and your child have an opportunity to learn about some of the latest research on how to make more informed choices of mobile apps. There are no preparatory requirements for completing the study.

What happens to the results of the study?

The audio and video files collected in the study will be transcribed by the researchers directly involved in the study only. All identifiable information will be removed from the transcriptions as they are collected, prior to analysis, in order to reduce the likelihood that any personal identifying or re-identifiable information will be retained. The recordings will then be destroyed, and the transcriptions will be analysed to identify patterns and generate research findings.

The resulting anonymised data will be stored on Oxford University’s data storage facilities, secured by the IT department. All consent and assent forms obtained for the study will be locked in a secure locker in the university office. Access to these items will be limited to members of the project team directly involved in the study.

The research results will be disseminated as public reports, technical reports, as well as academic publications, which may be one to two years from the end of the study. We will ask all participants for their permission to use direct quotes.

The University of Oxford is committed to the dissemination of its research for the benefit of society and the economy and, in support of this commitment, it has established an online archive of research materials. All journal articles and conference papers (in publications with an ISSN) published by Oxford researchers will be deposited in the Oxford University Research Archive (ORA) within three months of acceptance for publication. The archive is openly accessible to every internet user.

All research data and records will be stored for a minimum retention period of 10 years after publication or public release of the work of the research. Data will only be transferred across the research team through password protected university systems or the handover of a non-networked encrypted hard drive. The data that we collect from you will NOT be transferred to, and stored or processed at, a destination outside the European Economic Area ("EEA"). All personally identifiable data will be protected under the General Data Protection Regulation, including post-Brexit.

Who is conducting this research?

The research project is organised by Dr Jun Zhao of Oxford University, who is a Senior Researcher at the Department of Computer Science. The research is funded by the EPSRC Impact Acceleration Grant. The project will be carried out by Dr Zhao, together with an external app designer or a research assistant, both of whom will be under strict supervision of Dr Zhao and receive appropriate safeguarding training before participating in the study. This project has been reviewed by, and received ethics clearance through, the Research Ethics Committee at the Department of Computer Science at the University of Oxford SSD/CUREC1A CS_C1A_18_028.

What if there is a problem?

If you have any concern about any aspect of this project, please speak to the relevant researcher (Dr Zhao; 01865 273 875) or their supervisor (Prof. Shadbolt; 01865 279 701) who will do their best to answer your query. The researcher should acknowledge your concern within 10 working days and give you an indication of how they intend to deal with it. If you remain unhappy or wish to make a formal complaint, please contact the Chair of the Research Ethics Committee at the University of Oxford, who will seek to resolve the matter in a reasonably expeditious manner.

Chair, Social Sciences & Humanities Inter-Divisional Research Ethics Committee;

Email: ethics@socsci.ox.ac.uk;

Address: Research Services, University of Oxford, Wellington Square, Oxford OX1 2JD

What should I do next?

If you are interested to take part in the study, then you can email us (jun.zhao@cs.ox.ac.uk) back of your availability of the following workshop slots:

• 2pm-3:30pm April 16
• 2pm-3:30pm April 17
• 10am-11:30am April 18
• 2pm-3:30pm April 18
• 4pm-5:30pm April 24
• 4pm-5:30pm April 25
• 4pm-5:30pm April 26
• 4pm-5:30pm April 30
• 4pm-5:30pm May 1

Once your session is confirmed, you and your child will be invited to our research lab on Oxford’s Parks Road, and join in a design workshop that will last about 1.5 hours, with two other families. You will receive a £20 Amazon voucher as a thank-you gift. Travel cost will be reimbursed up to £20 per trip.

Please remember that you may withdraw you and your child at any time, without penalty and without giving a reason, by notifying the researcher.

If you would like to discuss the research with someone beforehand (or if you have questions afterwards), please contact:

• Dr Jun Zhao
• Department of Computer Science
• University of Oxford
• Wolfson Building.
• Parks Road. Oxford. OX1 3QD
• Email: jun.zhao@cs.ox.ac.uk