Why does HCI belong in a CS department?
There was a debate during Friday’s tea time about why HCI belongs in a CS department. The discussion was motivated by experiences explaining our research area to other CS graduate students and faculty.
One approach is to question the challenge in the first place — why is computer architecture or theory part of Computer Science? They could just as easily be construed as belonging to EE or Math departments.
Another view is that the defining element of Computer Science is computation. HCI researchers in computer science care about what can (and should) be done with computation, with a focus on the user and the interaction. Related, one could argue that everyone who does computer science is also producing interfaces, and that we need to understand and advance interface science as steadily as we do other areas.
Thoughts? Let us know.
- Chen-Hsiang (Jones) Yu
If we where to discuss the proper placement of HCI, it might just as well be placed within the psychology department. Within HCI, the human part requires insight in the actual human, not just the computer and the interface. Traditionally, an alternative department would be arts. Arts have a long tradition of interacting with humans. Computers barely interacts with other computers
The norwegian user experience consultancy NetLife Research have more people with psychology background than from IT.
The reason why HCI, UX, IxD, usability (Pick one) belong within the CS department
The question you should be asking, is why the department is named Computer Science?
Andreas