r/hci

Hi all! Was wondering if there is a lot of coding/programming involved in an HCI PhD program. I wanted to focus on more of the psychology side and doing research on AI and HCI. I understand this field is quite broad nd I've heard others joining with very diverse backgrounds, but not sure how that works in a PhD if some are unable to code for example, or is that typically a hard requirement.... or does it really depend on what you focus your thesis on?

Any perspective would be great!

Hello, I'm an experienced UX designer and software engineer (11yoe), I was originally self taught but have since finished a Bachelor of Computer Science while working and I can do a really inexpensive Graduate Certificate of Design starting in August, it's 4 modules that could be pretty useful including formal UX, tangible design, communication design and leadership. I wonder if it's worth the stress juggling it on top of work to get some extra credentials on top of my CS degree to either improve employability or be considered for research masters if the market goes even worse and I need to make poverty research wages. Any thoughts?

Hi everyone,
I’m an international student, so I may not fully understand how program reputation works in the US.
What confuses me is that when people talk about the strongest universities overall, I don’t often see UW grouped with schools like CMU, Berkeley, or Michigan. However, when I look at UX/HCI-specific rankings, UW HCDE is often ranked at or near the top.
I’m considering UW MS HCDE, UT Austin MSIS, and Berkeley MDes, and I’m interested in both industry careers (UX design/research) and possibly pursuing a PhD later.
Is UW HCDE actually considered one of the very best UX/HCI programs by people in the field, or do rankings give a different impression than reality?
I’d love to hear perspectives from people in industry, academia, or alumni of these programs.
Thanks!

Hi everyone,

We just open-sourced NeuraDock Visual Cognitive Load Agent, a local-first EEG agent that turns EEG data into a real-time cognitive-load API for AI agents, BCI prototypes, HCI/XR systems, and adaptive interfaces.

The idea is simple:

Instead of treating EEG as just offline signal analysis, we want to make it usable as a local API:

EEG file / synthetic replay / NeuraDock hardware
        ↓
preprocessing + signal quality gating
        ↓
alpha dynamics + visual cognitive-load estimation
        ↓
local dashboard + API endpoint
        ↓
AI agents / XR / HCI / neurofeedback apps

A few things we wanted to make clear:

• No hardware required to start: you can run the agent with synthetic replay or example EEG data.

​

git clone https://github.com/Neuradock/eeg-workstation-agent.git
cd eeg-workstation-agent
python -m venv .venv && source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -e ".[dev]"
neuradock-agent serve --port 8765
# open http://127.0.0.1:8765

• Works with hardware too: if you have NeuraDock EEG hardware, it can run as a real-time closed-loop cognitive-load monitor.
• Full toolchain is open-source: data loading, preprocessing, quality control, cognitive-load analysis, dashboard, and API.
• Local-first design: the core signal processing runs locally; the LLM layer is optional and receives summarized outputs rather than raw dense EEG streams.
• Developer-oriented: the goal is to make EEG usable by AI developers, BCI builders, HCI/XR researchers, and open-source hardware communities.

We also wrote a short paper/tutorial explaining the architecture and design choices.

GitHub:
https://github.com/Neuradock/eeg-workstation-agent

Article / tutorial:
https://arxiv.org/html/2606.26518v1

Short demo video:
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/9MWe_rCnWNY

.exe applications:

https://github.com/Neuradock/eeg-workstation-agent/releases/tag/Neuradock_Cognitive_Load_Agent

I’d love feedback from people working on EEG, BCI, neurotech, AI agents, XR/HCI, or adaptive interfaces.

A few questions we’re thinking about:

1. What would be the most useful “killer app” for a real-time cognitive-load API?
2. Would you use this more as a research tool, a developer API, or a hardware demo platform?
3. What integrations would make this more useful: OpenClaw, Claude Code/Codex workflows, Unity, Unreal, browser extension, VS Code, or something else?

Happy to hear criticism too. We’re trying to make EEG more accessible and useful for developers, not just for offline neuroscience analysis.

I know the market is bad everywhere but I want to know from people here who have done masters elsewhere in countries other than USA/ Australia/ UK.
I am also considering from the long term job perspective where getting a work visa is easier after masters. PhD is also my plan b if things go well. I need a change from my 9-5 job and taking a career break seems good.
(Work ex : 4+ yrs in ux )