Experience
Brock R. Dubbels PhD
User Research
Dept. Psychology, Neuroscience, & Behavior
McMaster University
415.968.9072
Summary:
- Eight years of researching user experience architecture for cross platform mobile applications.
- Identified target audiences’ needs, user stories, personas, work flow diagrams, min-ethnography, and survey construction.
- Task analysis with statistics.
- Goal orientation analysis increased engagement
- Translation into creative concepts and functional components, including translating business requirements into engaging interactive experiences.
- Reduced production costs by 25%.
- Provided return on investment analysis
- Data informed development
- Expertise in quick research methods
- Translate data into consumer insights and design
- I contribute to the development of user experience design as an intellectual discipline and creatively produce innovation.
- Tools: Axure, Morae, LookBack, Photo Shop, Balsamiq, Power Point, Class Apps, R Statistical Software
User Experience Research and Development
October 2014 – Present
Dept. of Psychology, Neuroscience, and Behavior
McMaster University Hamilton, ON
Create projects through funding solicited from granting agencies.
Design and manage project:
- Create and submit research plan for review.
- Identified corporate partner
- Identified research problem and audience
- Obtained funding
- Conducted research and translation for customer insights and design
- This includes project ownership: budgeting, personnel, equipment, methods sample recruitment, laboratory scheduling, Ethics compliance, pace of data collection, analysis of data, creation of daily, weekly, and summative technical reports for development team.
Currently supported research:
- NSERC EGP #469097-14: Can games be used to improve children’s spatial reasoning?
- NSERC EGP 477442-15: Development of Life Review Software for Early Stage Alzheimer’s Patients
Director of User Experience Research
Laboratory Manager
2012 – 2014
G-Scale Video Game Development and Testing Laboratory
McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Department of Computing and Software
- Manage CFI grant budget $2.5 million
- Vendor management –cut costs by 60%
- Purchase and implementation of laboratory equipment – donations of $150,000
- Create and Manage Research proposals
- Train laboratory assistants
- Recruit industry partners
Courses taught:
- Sensory Perception, Cognition And Human/Computer Interfaces For Game Design
- Usability and User Experience Research
Project Manager Computer Based Training
United Health Group
August 2010 – May 2012
User research and Project Management consultant
- Cut development costs by 25%
- Development of serious games, computer-based training modules, and efficacy assessment for online learning.
- Lead teams in user research for requirements gathering, development, testing, and outcomes.
- Special emphasis on requirements gathering, implementation, user experience, and team management.
1 recommendation available upon request
Chief Consultant, advisor to the Office of the Chancellor on serious games, simulations and virtual world projects.
Minnesota State Colleges and Universities
2003 – 2010
- Project Manager, User research, and Learning Architect
- Cut scope and costs of projects from $400,000.00 to $15,000.00 each
- Created budget, research plan, laboratory affiliation,
- Designed research topic, questions and methods, analysis and budget
- Translated research in actionable development requirements
Editor in Chief
January 2014 – Present
International Journal of Games and Computer-Mediated Simulations
Education
Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship 2012-2014
McMaster University
PhD, Curriculum & Instruction
University of Minnesota-Twin Cities 2007 – 2011
Center for Cognitive Sciences
Thesis: The Brain Is For Action: Video Games to Improve January 2012
Reading Comprehension and Scientific Problem Solving
Master of Arts, Curriculum & Instruction
University of Minnesota-Twin Cities 2004 – 2007
NIH Fellow – Quality of life study for organ transplant recipients 2004
HumanFirst Driving Simulation Laboratory 2005-2007
Master of Arts, Educational Psychology
University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, 1999 – 2003
Center for Cognitive Sciences – Research Associate
Board of Regents Fellowship 2000-2001
Fulbright Scholar –Department of Psychology, 2001-2002
Norwegian University of Science & Technology
Low Vision Laboratory 2002-2003
Bachelor of Science, Education
Winona State University 1997–1999
University of California, Berkeley 1991-1992
DeAnza College 1988-1990
Internship Xerox PARC 1988-1990
Oracle Corporation 1991-1992
Major Awards
NSF Scholarship Recipient ICCS3
National Science Foundation 2000
Wrote and received project proposal for funding and presentation of research
- Examination of teaching complex systems for problem solving and critical thinking in the classroom with computer-mediated modeling, simulation, and game techniques using the tools and methods of Complexity Theory.
NSF Scholarship Recipient ICCS5
National Science Foundation 2002
Wrote and received project proposal for funding and presentation of research
- The use of modeling and simulation software for teaching the science and methods of complex systems.
Fulbright Scholar 2002-2003
Fulbright Foundation Fellowship Award Recipient
Wrote and received research proposal requesting one year of support.
- Created budget, research plan, identified mentor, laboratory affiliation,
- Designed research topic, questions and methods, analysis and budget
- Created technical reports, conference presentations
- Lab demonstrations in Dresden and Worms, Germany; Irkutsk, Russia; Beijing, China.
Projects included:
- The use of computer simulations for teaching science
- Importance of phrase boundaries in text
- Research Assistant for Rapid ELearning Project in Civil Engineering,
Classes taught: Research Methods in Psychology – Mellomfag
Advisor: Prof. Ivar Bjoergen in Psychology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, in Trondheim, Norway.
Board of Regents Grant Recipient
University of Minnesota Graduate School May 2002
Wrote and received project proposal for funding pre-Fulbright research at NTNU
- Funding for early-start research on the use of models and simulations to encourage scientific thinking
Advisor: Prof. Ivar Bjoergen in Psychology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, in Trondheim, Norway.
NIH Berman Fellowship
National Institutes of Health May 2003
The University of Minnesota
Wrote and received project proposal for funding study of psychological states and traits in quality of life for organ transplant recipients.
- State and trait based measures for analysis of quality of life and the role of mindfulness
Additional Awards
Bush Foundation’s for Excellence in Teaching (NExT) (2005 -2006)
Support and manage the University of Minnesota implementation of the Bush Foundation for Integration of Standards in Practice for improvement of content reading instruction. Qualitative analysis of statewide reading licensure courses in the state of Minnesota, using INVIVO software for thematic coding. This work supported the Teacher Education Redesign Initiative (TERI)
GECS: Games in Engineering and Computer Science
National Science Foundation June 2010
There is a critical need to improve learning and retention in engineering and computer science in the United States. At the same time a growing body of research indicates that well-designed games could have a significant impact on motivation and learning. This has created new opportunities for advancing research and innovation in engineering and computer science education through the use of games.
New Discovery — Best Article
IGI Global New Discovery, July 2010: Dance Dance Education paper chosen and republished with IGI global republished as a chapter as a “new discovery”
Best Paper – Meaningful Play Conference, Michigan State University
An Empirical Comparison of a Video Game, Digital Video, and Printed Text for Recall, Comprehension, and Solving a STEM Word Problem.
Mike Skinner Community Service Award – McMaster University
Creation of Hammertown Coder Dojo for teaching children to create and program video games.
Publications
GRANT WRITING
NSERC EGP #469097-14: Can games be used to improve children’s spatial reasoning?
NSERC EGP 477442-15: Development of Life Review Software for Early Stage Alzheimer’s Patients
Cyberlearning 11-587: NSF Working Memory in Game-Based Science Learning (submitted)
SBIR RFA-MH-14-010: NIH—gaming, olfaction, and cognitive remediation (submitted).
EHR Core Research 13-555, NSF – Development of Control of Variables Problem Solving in Game Based Learning – Bad Robots (in preparation).
Cyberlearning 11-587, NSF Transforming Education Gaming Proposal: Goldberg Variations (in preparation)
CHAPTERS
Dubbels, B.R. (accepted) Pedagogy & Play: Creating a Playful Curriculum for Academic Achievement and Engaged Learning. International Game Developers Association. Etc. Press.
Dubbels, B.R. (2010) Designing Learning Activities for Sustained Engagement — Four Social Learning Theories Coded and Folded into Principals for Instructional Design through Phenomenological Interview and Discourse Analysis. In Discoveries
Dubbels, B.R. (2010) Teaching Complex Systems in the Classroom. Unifying Themes in Complex Systems/ Springer
O’Brien, D.G. & Dubbels, B. (2009) Promoting technological literacy. In Wood, K.E. & Blanton, W.E. (Eds.) Promoting Literacy with Adolescent Learners: Research-based Instruction. Guilford Publications.
Dubbels, B.R. (2008) Video games, reading, and transmedial comprehension. In R. E. Ferdig (Ed.),Reference. Information ScienceHandbook of research on effective electronic gaming in education.
Dubbels, B.R. (2008). Student blogging about their video game experience. In R. Beach, C. Anson, L. Breuch, & T. Swiss, T. Engaging students in digital writing. Norwood, MA: Christopher Gordon.
Dubbels, B.R. (2007) Simplifying Literature with Complexity. Unifying Themes in Complex Systems: New research …, Volume 3, Part 2/ Springer
ARTICLES
Dubbels, B.R. (in preparation) A Mixed-Method Comparison of New Literacies as Games, Video, to Improve Reading and Text Comprehension for Scientific Problem Solving. Reading Research Quarterly.
Dubbels, B.R., (in preparation) Video Games as Learning Tools: An Empirical Comparison of Video Games, Digital Video, and Printed Text for Delivering Successful Recall and Comprehension for Scientific Problem Solving. Computers in Education.
Dubbels, B. R. (in preparation) Distinguishing Learning Activities and Software: A Framework for UX Design, Development, & Gamification. Computing and Human Behavior.
Dubbels, B.R. (submitted) The Vegas Effect: A Case Study for the Design of Serious Games to Deliver Serious Learning and Provide the Capacity for Return on Investment Analysis.
Dubbels, B.R. (2014) Cognitive Ethnography & Causal Network Analysis as a Mixed-Method for Game User research. 2014 Games User Research workshop. Computer-Human Interaction (CHI) 2014 http://chi2014.acm.org/
Dubbels, B.R. (2014) Distinguishing Games, Work, Fun, Flow and Play: A Framework for Design, Development, & Gamification. INTENSIONS ISSUE 7: Fun and Games –Playing to the Limit. York University Press, Toronto, ON: CANADA
Dubbels, B.R. (2013) Gamification, Serious Games, Ludic Simulation, and other Contentious Categories. Ludic Simulations Special Issue. 5(2) The International Journal of Games and Computer-Mediated Simulations. IGI Global.
Dubbels, B. R. (2011). Cognitive Ethnography: A Methodology for Measure and Analysis of Learning for Game Studies. International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations. Special Issue on Virtual Environments for Learning. 3(1) IGI Publishers
Dubbels, B. R. (2009) Dance Dance Education and Rites of Passage. International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations. 1(4) IGI Publishers
Kwon M., Legge G.E., Dubbels B.R. (2007) Developmental changes in the visual span for reading. Vision Research, 47 (22), pp. 2889-2900. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Kwon M., Legge G.E., Dubbels B.R. (2005) Developmental changes in the visual span for reading. Journal of Vision September 1, 2005 vol. 5 no. 8 article 807
BOOK REVIEWS
Dubbels, B.R. (2010) Understanding Video Games: the Essential Introduction. International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations. 2(2) IGI Publishers
COMMISSIONED PAPERS
Dubbels, B.R. (2010) Providing Purpose and True-Calling: Education and Lifespan Development For Learners Aged 50+. Commissioned by Capella University as an RFI for AARP.
O’Brien, D.G. & Dubbels B.R. (2004) Reading-to-Learn: From Print to New Digital Media and New Literacies. NCREL (North Central Research Education Laboratory). White Paper.
Grant Review
5 Star Schools, US Dept. of Education
Internal Review Board, Human Subjects Committee. University of Minnesota
Editorial Review
Editor in Chief : International Journal of Games and Computer Meditated Simulations
Editor of Special Issues 4(3) & 5(3) Ludica Medica.
Associate Editor: International Journal of Games and Computer Meditated Simulations
Review Editor: Interacting with Computers, Oxford University Press.
Charter Review: Minnesota Guild of Charter Schools
Working Review: Minnesota Department of Education—MCA2 Reading Assessment.