معرفی
Professor Helen Purchase is a Full Professor in the Department of Human Centred Computing at Monash University's Faculty of Information Technology. She holds leadership roles as Director of the Data Visualisation and Immersive Analytics lab and Director of Education for the HCC Department. Previously, she held senior roles at the University of Glasgow (2001-2022) and University of Queensland (1995-2001), receiving multiple teaching awards including Senior Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy (2015). Her academic journey includes a PhD from Cambridge University (1992), MPhil in Computer Speech and Language Processing (Cambridge), and undergraduate studies at Rhodes University, South Africa.
Research focuses on human understanding of visual stimuli, pioneering empirical studies in graph drawing usability since 1995. Key contributions include foundational work on mental map preservation in dynamic graphs, evaluation frameworks for visualization effectiveness, and development of PeerWise platform for student-generated assessments. Her 2012 textbook Experimental Human-Computer Interaction remains a key reference in empirical HCI research.
- Core research areas: Graph Visualization, HCI Methodology, Educational Technology
- Notable collaborations: Multi-university projects on 3D visualization, pandemic healthcare systems, and multivariate network analysis
- Lab leadership: Data Visualisation and Immersive Analytics lab at Monash
Active in curriculum development, she introduced pioneering HCI courses at University of Queensland and expanded postgraduate programs at Glasgow. Current research explores 3D graph perspectives, cognitive effects of visual bundling, and pandemic-era telemedicine interfaces.
