Human-Computer Interaction – (M.Sc.)

In addition to the continued development of increasingly powerful and portable personal computers, a range of new artefacts is appearing, including car navigation devices and electronic books, adding to a large number of traditional artefacts, such as cameras, phones, washing machines, and fitness equipment, all of which are IT-artefacts which include advanced information processing components.

The trend towards the widespread use of IT-artefacts is one of the key aspects of the so-called "digital transformation", a revolutionary transformation of our culture and society that places a heavy emphasis on information and knowledge. This trend gives rise to new phenomena of human interaction with technology and world.

Computational capabilities of the interactive things we use every day, combined with powerful new communication, input, and output capabilities, provide great possibilities for human action but also create numerous problems. Realising this potential effectively and efficiently requires that the interaction between people and IT-artefacts becomes an object of study dealing with both people and technology.

Human-computer interaction is this area of knowledge. Human-computer interaction has its focus on interaction between people and technology, but as an area of knowledge it is intrinsically multi-disciplinary and builds on a number of more traditional research areas, such as computing science, informatics, interaction design, design studies, web design, information systems, psychology, and more.

The Master´s programme in Human-computer interaction at Umeå University offers a coherent set of courses, which will provide you with the competence necessary for carrying out practical and research work related to the analysis and design of interaction between people and IT-artefacts. You will, for instance, be able to perform pre-design user studies, conceptual design of novel artefacts, prototype development, usability evaluation, and assessment of the effects of the deployment of new technologies.

The programme pays special attention to practical projects, within which the students acquire experience and skills of working in project teams that include people with different disciplinary backgrounds.