Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology (ICAT)

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https://hdl.handle.net/10919/23759
The Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology is uniquely partnered with the Center for the Arts at Virginia Tech. By forging a pathway between trans-disciplinary research and art, educational innovation, and scientific and commercial discovery, the institute works to foster the creative process to create new possibilities for exploration and expression through learning, discovery, and engagement.

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Browsing Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology (ICAT) by Department "Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology (ICAT)"

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    Disciplinary Influences on the Professional Identity of Civil Engineering Students: Starting the Conversation
    Groen, Cassandra J.; Simmons, Denise Rutledge; McNair, Elizabeth D. (2016-06)
    As the discipline of civil engineering has evolved from an apprentice-based trade to a socially-engaged profession, the role of the civil engineer has responded to shifts within the ever-changing culture of society. These shifts and historical events have directly influenced what is considered to be valued civil engineering knowledge, behaviors, and practices that we teach to students during their undergraduate careers. As part of a larger grounded theory study that is currently being conducted by the authors, the purpose of this paper is two-fold. First, we present the topic of professional identity formation as heavily influenced by unique historical events that shape the civil engineering discipline. . To establish the connection between identity formation and the history of civil engineering, we interpret historical events as constituents that create a disciplinary identity that is communicated to and subjectively applied by students during their undergraduate careers. Second, we hope to promote and invoke conversations surrounding the relevancy of civil engineering professional identity formation in engineering education among our colleagues within the technical disciplines. Through this paper, we add to ongoing research exploring the professional formation of engineering identities and promote discussions surround this topic at the disciplinary level. While most research conducted on identity formation has been generalized to include all or most engineering disciplines, we focus our discussion solely on professional identity formation within the civil engineering discipline. To reinforce the relationship between the history of the civil engineering profession and students’ professional identity formation, we review the literature on these two areas of inquiry. In particular, we will frame our paper using the following key discussion points: 1) providing a brief overview of key historical events of civil engineering in the United States; 2) discussing the influence of this history on instructor pedagogies and student learning within civil engineering education; and 3) conceptualizing this learning process as a means of professional identity formation. From this work, we will begin to understand how major historical shifts within our discipline maintain the potential to impact its future as we educate the next generation of civil engineering students. To conclude this paper, we will introduce current research that is being conducted by the authors to further understand the nuances of professional identity formation in undergraduate civil engineering students and how instructors may help or hinder that development.
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    Reimagining Human Capacity For Location-Aware Aural Pattern Recognition: A Case For Immersive Exocentric Sonification
    Bukvic, Ivica Ico; Earle, Gregory D. (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2018-06)
    The following paper presents a cross-disciplinary snapshot of 21st century research in sonification and leverages the review to identify a new immersive exocentric approach to studying human capacity to perceive spatial aural cues. The paper further defines immersive exocentric sonification, highlights its unique affordances, and presents an argument for its potential to fundamentally change the way we understand and study the human capacity for location-aware audio pattern recognition. Finally, the paper describes an example of an externally funded research project that aims to tackle this newfound research whitespace.
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    Studies In Spatial Aural Perception: Establishing Foundations For Immersive Sonification
    Bukvic, Ivica Ico; Earle, Gregory D.; Sardana, Disha; Joo, Woohun (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2019-06)
    The Spatial Audio Data Immersive Experience (SADIE) project aims to identify new foundational relationships pertaining to human spatial aural perception, and to validate existing relationships. Our infrastructure consists of an intuitive interaction interface, an immersive exocentric sonification environment, and a layer-based amplitude-panning algorithm. Here we highlight the system’s unique capabilities and provide findings from an initial externally funded study that focuses on the assessment of human aural spatial perception capacity. When compared to the existing body of literature focusing on egocentric spatial perception, our data show that an immersive exocentric environment enhances spatial perception, and that the physical implementation using high density loudspeaker arrays enables significantly improved spatial perception accuracy relative to the egocentric and virtual binaural approaches. The preliminary observations suggest that human spatial aural perception capacity in real-world-like immersive exocentric environments that allow for head and body movement is significantly greater than in egocentric scenarios where head and body movement is restricted. Therefore, in the design of immersive auditory displays, the use of immersive exocentric environments is advised. Further, our data identify a significant gap between physical and virtual human spatial aural perception accuracy, which suggests that further development of virtual aural immersion may be necessary before such an approach may be seen as a viable alternative.
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    Technology helps students transcend part-whole concepts
    Norton, Anderson H. III; Wilkins, Jesse L. M.; Evans, Michael A.; Deater-Deckard, Kirby; Balci, Osman; Chang, Mido (2014-02)
    How would your students make sense of the fraction 5/7? Would they interpret it as 5 parts out of 7 equal parts? Could they also understand it as a piece that is 5 times as large as 1/7? The former interpretation aligns with part-whole conceptions, whereas the latter aligns with partitive conceptions. Steffe and Olive (2010) have made such distinctions in students’ fractional knowledge to explain why students experience difficulties with fractions and to help students overcome those difficulties. (For summaries of this work, see Norton and McCloskey 2008 and 2009.) We introduce an educational video game (application, or app) designed to promote students’ development of partitive understanding while demonstrating the critical need to promote that development. The app includes essential game features of immediate feedback, incentives, and summary information for refl ection and discussion (Evans et al. 2013).