Research Associate (Co-Design for Smart Data Donation Services)

The Smart Data Donation Service
We seek an outstanding co-design researcher for a 3-year fixed-term position as part of the Smart Data Donation Service (SDDS). The SDDS is a major infrastructure project funded by Smart Data Research UK, which aims to catalyse a paradigm shift in the quality and accessibility of smart data for research into digital and online experiences (e.g. games, social media). The SDDS will achieve this by creating a service that facilitates the large-scale donation of data by the individuals that it features. This will be made possible due to the UK’s GDPR regulations, which allow people to access personal data that companies hold about them so that they can donate it securely for research purposes.

Role
This role is a unique opportunity: as the successful candidate, you will help to drive profound societal change at a key juncture in online safety and digital wellbeing; and will engage in large-scale team science, tapping into the support of an inclusive and vibrant new research institution to enact this vision.

You will play a key role in the design, development and evaluation of the SDDS. You will lead underpinning research that explores an exciting range of topics around potential donors’ perceptions, understandings and experiences of data donation (e.g. exploring the motivations that drive data donation and the barriers that could prevent it) and the research community's requirements for data and methods of working with it. You will also lead the development and execution of co-design processes that directly involve these groups in the creation of services that they will be motivated to use and benefit from. The outcomes of your work will directly shape the development of the SDDS — working closely with a user-experience designer and our software development team to translate findings into actionable designs, and by leading evaluations of people’s experiences with the service that support its iteration. You will be supported to publish your findings in high quality academic conferences and journals, and will be given opportunities to engage in the process of writing research grant applications and research leadership.

Skills, Experience & Qualification Needed
As the successful candidate, you will have a PhD in a topic that relates to the understanding of people and their interactions with interactive systems (e.g. Design, Psychology, Sociology, Human-Computer Interaction, UX) or equivalent experience. You will have knowledge of: research methods that enable the understanding of donors’ and researchers’ perceptions, needs, barriers and experiences of data donation and services that enable it; co-design approaches that can be used to involve a diverse community of donors and researchers in directly shaping the design of the data donation service; and research methods appropriate for evaluating people’s experiences of using digital interactive systems. We particularly seek candidates with specialist research knowledge in a field that relates to the goals of the data donation service (e.g. human-data interaction, the psychology of data donation) and/or knowledge of the area of online domains and experiences where smart data is gathered and processed (e.g. digital games, social media). However, we also encourage applications from candidates with transferable experience of applying co-design research methods in other domains, who can demonstrate a passion for the topic and goals of the SDDS.

Interview date: Early February 2025

For informal enquiries: please contact Prof. Jonathan Hook on jonathan.hook@york.ac.uk.

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