Valentina studied towards a PhD in Education and Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) at Moray House School of Education and Sport (MHSES), the University of Edinburgh. Her PhD was focused on ethically designing and evaluating digital technology, aimed at supporting young children’s play in a hospital setting. Towards this end, she immersed herself in a hospital setting, allowing her to work closely with children, parents and practitioners.
As a Postdoctoral Researcher, Valentina has been working on a research project aimed at exploring school-aged children’s perceptions of conversational assistants (such as Amazon’s Alexa) and artificial intelligence (AI). Together with Professor Judy Robertson from the Centre for Research in Digital Education, The University of Edinburgh, she has conducted a mixed-methods approach study with primary-school children in Scotland to understand their awareness and how they interact with such systems. Valentina has worked on various other research projects involving children, such as employing a participatory approach with primary and secondary-school children on a project focused on understanding children’s reading motivation.
Valentina’s research interests largely lie at the intersection of education and Human-Computer Interaction (HCI): educational technology, participatory approaches, inclusive design and evaluation of technology, ethics in technology design, AI ethics.
Selected Publications
- Andries, V., & Robertson, J. “Alexa doesn’t have that many feelings”: Children’s understanding of AI through interactions with smart speakers in their homes. Available as ArXiv preprint: https://arxiv.org/abs/2305.05597
- Constantin, A., Andries, V., Korte, J., Alexandru, C., Good, J., Sim, J., Read, J., Fails, J.A., & Eriksson, E. (2022). Ethical Considerations of Distributed Participatory Design with Children. In Interaction Design and Children (IDC ’22), Braga, Portugal. ACM, New York, NY, USA, https://doi.org/10.1145/3501712.3536386
- Andries, V., Niven, A., & Smith, C. (Sept 2021). Social Media Research: Ethical Guidance for Researchers at the University of Edinburgh. Centre for Data, Culture & Society, The University of Edinburgh. Available here: https://edin.ac/3hTvAhB.
- Andries, V., & Savadova, S. (2021). Understanding the Role of Digital Technology in the Transitions of Refugee Families with Young Children into A New Culture: A Case Study of Scotland. In Interaction Design and Children (IDC ’21), June 24–30, 2021, Athens, Greece. ACM, New York, NY, USA, 5 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3459990.3465185.
- Wilkinson, K., Andries, V., Howarth, D., Bonsall, J., Sabeti, S., & McGeown, S. (2021). Reading During Adolescence: Why Adolescents Choose (or Do Not Choose) Books. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 64(2), 157-166.
- McGeown, S., Bonsall, J., Andries, V., Howarth, D., & Wilkinson, K. (2020). Understanding Reading Motivation Across Different Text Types: Qualitative Insights from Children. Journal of Research in Reading, 43(4), 597-608.
- McGeown, S., Bonsall, J., Andries, V., Howarth, D., Wilkinson, K., & Sabeti, S. (2020). Growing up a Reader: Exploring children’s and adolescents’ perceptions of ‘a reader’. Educational Research, 62(2), 216-228.
- Andries, V., & Robertson, J. (2019). Designing Social Play to Support Young Hospitalised Children. In Interaction Design and Children (IDC ’19), June 12–15, 2019, Boise, ID, USA. ACM, New York, NY, USA, 6 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3311927.3325317.
- Andries, V. (2018). Play Technology with 3-5-Year Old Children in a Hospital Setting. In Proceedings of the 2018 Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play Companion Extended Abstracts (CHI PLAY ’18 Extended Abstracts, Melbourne, Australia). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 5-10. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3270316.3270608.
Selected Presentations
- Savadova, S., & Andries, V. (2021). How can interactions with digital media foster refugee families’ transitions to a new culture in Edinburgh? British Educational Research Association (BERA) Annual Conference, United Kingdom.
- Andries, V., & McGeown, S. (2019). Growing up a Reader: Lessons learnt from training primary school students as researchers. United Kingdom Literacy Association Conference, Sheffield, United Kingdom. Paper presentation
- Andries, V. & Robertson, J. (2019). Ethics in participatory design approaches. Human-Computer Interaction – Centre for Intelligent Systems and their Applications (CISA) interest group at the School of Informatics. Invited speakers
- Andries, V. (2018). Ethics in practice: A case study of researching play technology with sick children. Children and Technology event organised by the Digital Education group at Moray House, in collaboration with the Scottish Informatics and Computer Science Alliance. Invited speaker
Louise’s research interests include social inequities and education, gender and feminist theories, children’s literature, and creative methods. Her ESRC-funded doctoral research, which she undertook at the University of Glasgow, explored how children respond to and engage with contemporary biographies about women. Louise has been involved in various research projects with children, both in the UK and abroad. Last year she worked with non-profit organisations in Canada to better understand how organisations are encouraging girls to engage with STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths), and acted as a research consultant on the international, SSHRC-funded project, ‘Kids, KidTech and the Metaverse: Global Childhoods in Digital Capitalism’.
Louise has extensive experience of working in educational settings. She managed a network of children’s learning centres across London for a number of years and has taught in Australia, China and the UK. Louise has also delivered training sessions for early career researchers focusing on creative methods, research ethics, and research with children.
Louise holds a BA in English Language and Literature from King’s College London, an MA in Gender Studies from UCL and an MRes in Sociology and Research Methods from the University of Glasgow.
Publications
Articles in Peer-Reviewed Journals
Couceiro, L. (2022) Empowering or responsibilising? A critical content analysis of contemporary biographies about women. Barnboken: Journal of Children’s Literature Research, 45. DOI: https://doi.org/10.14811/clr.v45.687.
Chapters in Books
Couceiro, L. (2020) Disorientation and new directions: developing the reader response toolkit. In: Kara, H. and Khoo, S.-M. (eds.) Researching in the Age of COVID-19: Volume 1: Response and Reassessment. Policy Press: Bristol, UK, pp. 30-39. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv18gfz2s.8.
Non-Peer-Reviewed Publications
Couceiro, L. (2022) ‘Biographies about women in science: why it is important to engage all learners’. Primary Science (174), p. 17.
Couceiro, L. (2022) ‘Online Research with Children: Cultivating Better Practice with the Beauty of Hindsight‘, SAGE MethodSpace (27th July 2022).
Couceiro, L. & Strobel, M. (2022) ‘The Work of Annika Thor: Relatable, Entertaining and Brimming with Enthusiasm‘, iBbY UK Blog (17th February 2022).
Couceiro, L. (2021) ‘Contemporary Children’s Biographies About Women: A Laudable Endeavour, but Critical Reading Remains Crucial‘, UWE Education Blog (22nd December 2021).
Couceiro, L. (2021) ‘Facilitating Group Discussions With Participants on Zoom‘, SAGE MethodSpace (21st January 2021).
Conference Papers
‘Education and Roblox’ (2023) Kids, KidTech and the Metaverse: Global Childhoods in Digital Capitalism, Phase 1 Symposium, York University, Canada.
‘Contemporary Children’s Biographies: How are children responding to and ’empowering’ stories of ‘inspirational’ women?’ (2022) Emergent Femininities and Masculinities in 21st Century Media and Popular Culture Conference, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece.
‘Contemporary Biographies: What are the implications of inviting children to ‘change the world’, in a way that foregrounds specialisation?’ (2022) The Child and the Book Conference, L-Università ta’ Malta, Malta.
‘Children’s Biographies in the Nonfiction Renaissance: Analysing the relationship between readers’ responses, the pedagogic and the aesthetic’ (2021) IRSCL 2021 Conference (online),
Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Chile.
‘Sexual Education, Sexual Pleasure and Sexual Violence: A case for considering how queer theory can aid understandings of the hidden inequalities and challenges faced by individuals with learning disabilities’ (2021) ESA 2021 Conference (online).
”Fantastically Great Women’ and ‘Rebel Girls’: Do children’s biographies about women inspire or responsibilize young girls in their conceptions of girlhood?’ (2020) Conceptions of Girlhood Now and Then: “Girls’ Literature” and Beyond Conference (online), Linnæus University, Sweden.
‘Why Legislative Change is Not Enough: Critical discourse analysis of news reporting surrounding Scotland’s LGBTI inclusive education’ (2020) ECER Conference (cancelled due to Covid-19), University of Glasgow, Scotland
Sharvi has general responsibility for administrative and research support for the Excluded Lives Research Project. Sharvi acts as the first point of contact for enquiries about the research project, assists in producing and maintaining several sources of information on the website and managing publications and liaises with the communications team to publicise events and publications.
Lulu is a departmental lecturer at the Department and a research associate at the Oxford Internet Institute and Sociology Department Oxford. She is a sociologist and her research spans technology, education, work and employment and organisations.
Lulu leads a project funded by the British Academy, which investigates how educational technology (EdTech) transforms education. Specifically, the project studies the role of EdTech firms – who can be seen as the architects behind the technology – in shaping education by considering the socio-political contexts they are embedded in.
She also works on the project DomesticAI at the Oxford Internet Institute. In this project she focuses on the transformation of paid and unpaid work in the age of AI and robotics. With her team she designed a cross-national harmonised factorial survey experiment.
During her doctoral studies, she researched on the labour market, skills formation systems and organisation studies with a country comparative focus.
Lulu teaches the MSc programme Digital and Social Change and supervises MSc students, focusing on technology and society.
Publications
Peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters:
- Lehdonvirta, V., Shi, L.P. (corresponding author), Hertog, E., Nagase, N., Ohta, Y. (forthcoming): “The Future(s) of Unpaid Work: How susceptible do experts from different backgrounds think the domestic sphere to automation”, In: PLOS One, https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/vzwyd/
- Shi, L.P., Di Stasio, V. (2022): “Finding a job after unemployment – Education as a moderator of unemployment scarring in Norway and Switzerland”, In: Socio-Economic Review, p. 1–25. https://doi.org/10.1093/ser/mwaa056
- Shi, L.P., Wang, S. (2021): “Demand-side consequences of unemployment and horizontal skills mismatch across national contexts: An employer-based factorial survey experiment”, In: Social Science Research, p. 1-12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2021.102668
- Imdorf, C., Shi, L.P., Sacchi, S., Samuel, R. (2019): “Scars of early job insecurity across Europe: insights from a multi-country employer study”. In: B. Hvinden, C. Hyggen, M. A. Schoyen and T. Sirovatka, Youth Unemployment and Job Insecurity in Europe. Problems, Risk Factors and Policies, 1st ed. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, p. 93–116.
- Parsanoglou, D., Yfanti, A., Hyggen, C., Shi, L.P. (2019): “The impact of active labour market policies on young unemployed: A comparison between Greece and Norway.” In: B. Hvinden, J. O’Reilly, M. A. Schoyen and C. Hyggen, Negotiating early job insecurity. Well-being, scarring and resilience of European youth, 1st ed. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, p. 90–114.
- Shi, L.P., Imdorf, C., Samuel R., Sacchi, S. (2018): “How unemployment scarring affects skilled young workers: evidence from a factorial survey of Swiss recruiters”. In: Journal of Labour Market Research, 52, p.1–15.
Project working papers / policy briefs:
- Shi, L.P., Hertog, E., Nash, V. (2022): Written evidence on technology and data privacy. House of Commons, Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee. https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/109471/pdf/
- Shi, L.P., Imdorf, C., Sacchi, S., Samuel, R. (2017): “Employers assessments of young job applicants: Findings from a comparative study”. European Policy Brief, no. 6, p.1–5.
- Imdorf, C., Shi, L.P., Sacchi, S., Samuel, R., Hyggen, C., Stoilova, R., Yordanova, G., Boyadieva, P., Ilieva-Trichkova, P., Parsanoglou, D., Yfanti, A. (2017): “Explaining employers’ hiring decisions: A comparative study of employers’ risk assessment”. NEGOTIATE Working paper No. 7.3, p.1–35.
- Imdorf, I., Shi, L.P., Helbling, L., Sacchi, S., Samuel, R. (2016): “Institutional Determinants of early job insecurity in nine European Countries”. NEGOTIATE Working paper No. 3.4, p.1–43.
- Kilchmann, V., Kobler, C., Shi, L.P., Imdorf, C. (2016): “Strategies to improve labour market integration of young people: Comparing policy coordination in nine European countries”. NEGOTIATE Working paper No. 8.2, p.1–27.
- Hyggen, C., Imdorf, C., Parsanaglou, D., Sacchi, S., Samuel, R., Stoilova, R., Shi, L.P., Yfanti, A., Yordanova, G. (2016): “Understanding unemployment scars: A vignette experiment of employers’ decisions in Bulgaria, Greece, Norway and Switzerland”. NEGOTIATE Working paper No. 7.2, p.1–66.
- Abebe, D.S., Bussi, M., Buttler, D., Hyggen, C., Imdorf, C., Michoń, P., O’Reilly, J., Shi, L.P. (2016): “Explaining consequences of employment insecurity: The dynamics of scarring in the United Kingdom, Poland and Norway”. NEGOTIATE Working paper No. 6.2, p.1–50.
- Shi, L.P., Imdorf, C., Samuel, R. (2015): “Studying employers’ risk assessment and the role of institutions: An experimental design”. NEGOTIATE Working paper No. 7.1, p.1–25.
Lyudmila Nurse is an Honorary Research Fellow. A sociologist with over 30 years’ experience of research in education, culture, identities, and international social and policy development consultancy work. Dr Lyudmila Nurse’s research include international comparative studies of social mobility and education, identities and belonging, comparative inter-generational studies of identities, ethnic minorities and migrants, parenting, well-being of families with children and young people, application of advanced methods of qualitative, biographical, mixed methods and arts-based research.
She was Research Fellow and Co-Investigator at the Department of Education and previously held post-doctoral and visiting fellowships at universities of Edinburgh, Warwick, City (London) and was an Honorary Research Fellow at Oxford Brookes University. She also has extensive expertise in European comparative research and development consultancy in social and youth policy of countries of Eastern Europe. She is a co-editor of the Policy Press (Bristol) book series: Advances in Biographical Research. She is a co-founder and a research director of the Oxford XXI think tank. Lyudmila is currently Coordinator/Chair of the Research Network 03 ‘Biographical Perspectives on European Societies’ of the European Sociological Association (ESA), a member of the ESA Council of Research Networks and of the Cultural, Scientific and Medical Advisory Board of Music Mind Spirit Trust.
At the Department of Education she works in collaboration with Dr Ian Thompson and Professor Harry Daniels associating with the Socio-Cultural and Activity Theory Group. She was a Co-Investigator in AHRC-funded project Cultural Artefacts and Belonging: A comparative case study of displaced and refugee young people and families in Ukraine led by the Department of Education (2021-2022). In 2017-2019 as Research fellow in the Department of Education she worked with Professor Edward Melhuish and Professor Jaqueline Barnes in the EC H2020 project: Inclusive Education and Social Support to Tackle Inequalities in Society (ISOTIS) in which she led a comparative qualitative study of mothers with pre-school and primary school children from low-income families in two metropolitan areas of England: Greater London and North West England. She also coordinated comparative qualitative study of mothers from low-income families, families with immigrant background and ethnic minority background in ten EU countries: Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland and Portugal.
Research interests are:
- Theoretical approaches to cultural identities and belonging
- Social mobility and inclusive education
- Migration studies (educational migration; forced migration)
- Individual and families’ strategies in tackling impact of inequalities
- Parenting cultures
- Cultural identities and music
- Advanced qualitative, biographical, ethnographic and art-based methods
Publications
Books
- Nurse, L., Moran, L. and Sidiropulu-Janku, K. (editors) (forthcoming 2023) Biographical Research and the Meanings of Mothering: Life Choices, Identities and Methods. Bristol: Policy Press
Journal Special Issues:
- Guest co-editor with Professor Edward Melhuish of the Special Issue: Comparative Perspectives on Educational Inequalities in Europe of the Contemporary Social Science, Journal of the Academy of Social Sciences (2021) Volume 16, Issue 4 (2021), 417-522. https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rsoc21/16/4?nav=tocList
Book chapters:
- Nurse, L., Sidiropulu-Janku, K., Obrovska, J., Gajek, K., & J.Mbiatong. (2022)
The place of religious and non-religious values and beliefs in identities of mothers of young children: Methodological approach and empirical evidence from the European countries. In: Kuusisto, A. (editor): The Routledge International Handbook of the Place of Religion in Early Childhood Education. Routledge
- Nurse, L. and Robertson, C. (2021) The Art of Communication in the Socially Distanced Environment. In: Brown, A., Carbon, F., Chambers, B., Coomes, M., Coudenys, W., Rogers, J., Weyer, D. and M. Wilson (editors) Re-Imagining the Tower of Babel. Luxembourg: University of Luxembourg, pp 137-141.
- Nurse, L. (2020). Construction of Schooling Time as Part of Mothers’ Identities. In: Schilling and O’Neill (eds). Frontiers in Time Research-Einfuhrung in die interdisziplinare Zeitforschung. Springer VS, 287-310. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-658-31252-7_13
- Nurse, L, & O’Neill, M (two editions: 2018, 2019). Biographical Research in the UK: profiles and perspectives in: Lutz, H., Schiebel, M. and E. Tuider (editors) Handbuch Biographieforschung. Springer VS.
- Nurse, L., (2013). Biographical approach in the Study of Identities of Ethnic Minorities in Eastern Europe. In: Mrozowicki, A. and Turk, J.D. (editors) Realist Biography and European policy: An Innovative Approach to European Policy Studies. Leuven: Leuven University Press, Belgium.
- Nurse, L.& E.Sik (2011) Identity and music. Identity of place and cultural identities of generations. In: Axford, B. and Huggins, R. ( editors) Cultures and/of globalisation, Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, p. 171-201
Peer reviewed journal articles:
- Nurse, L. and Robertson, C. (forthcoming 2022) Hearing and Feeling the Music in Every Step: Musical Walks and Biographical Experience of Lockdown. Irish Journal of Sociology
- Nurse, L. and Melhuish, E. (2021). Comparative perspectives on educational inequalities in Europe: an overview of the old and emergent inequalities from a bottom-up perspective in: Contemporary Social Science, Volume 16, 2021 – Issue 4, 417-431. https://doi.org/10.1080/21582041.2021.1948095
- Nurse, L. (2016). Identities and a sense of belonging: young Lithuanians and Latvians from ethnic minorities. INTER., Vol., No 12, pp 21-33. http://jour.isras.ru/index.php/inter/article/view/4009
- Nurse, L., Gibson, A., and Surányi, R. (2016). Media Consumption and Self-Identification: Hungarian and Slovak case study, in: Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group. Volume 23, Number 6, pp. 705-724.
- Nurse, L., Sik, E. (2012). Zene és identitás, in: Pro Minoritate, 2012 tél., Budapest, pp. 3-39 (In Hungarian)
- Nurse, L (2012). A zene szerepe a magyarországi szlovákok etnikai identitásában in: Pro Minoritate, 2012 tél., Budapest, pp.40-57 (In Hungarian)
- Nurse, L. (2011). Music in the identities of Ethnic Slovaks in Hungary. In: Slovak Journal of Political Sciences, Volume 11,No3, pp. 249-266, Trnava: The Institute of Social Sciences, University of SS Cyril and Methodius.
International reports:
- Broekhuizen, M., Wolf, K., Francot, R., Moser, T., Pastori, G., Nurse, L., Melhuish, E. & P. Leseman (2019) (Editors). Resources, experiences, and support needs of families in disadvantaged communities.INTEGRATIVE REPORT D 2.5 https://www.isotis.org/en/publications/resources-experiences-and-support-needs-of-families-in- disadvantaged-communities
- United Nations World Youth Report, 2003. Consultant.
- Breen, P. J., Shionnemann, M-E., L. Nurse,L., Azzopardi,A., Lagree, J-C.& P. Lauritzen (2003) Youth Policy in Lithuania. Report by an international group of experts appointed by the Council of Europe. Council of Europe Publishing
- Helsingius, U., du Bois-Reymond, M., Nurse, L., Chan, V., Machado Pais, J. & D. Trestieni Ion. (2001) Youth Policy in Romania. Report by an international groups of Experts appointed by the Council of Europe. Council of Europe Publishing.