Hello Friends This will be the last post I’ll make in VRAC. In 3 days, I will be back in Wisconsin and the REU will be officially done. This blog will be pretty long and separated into 3 parts. The Final Week The final week has been extremely bittersweet since we are finishing up our projects. I am excited to see the final product, but with that it will be the end of the summer program. For most of the week I have been working on finishing up the paper with Lydia and Harrison, while also finishing up some of the MATLAB code. We had finished up most of the paper by Tuesday and were proofreading. I feel really good … Continue reading →

For our most recent HCI assignment, we are to pick 3 heuristics used in decision making and 3 design principles for the heuristics. Then we are to write how we can apply these 3 different pairs into our project. Heuristics Familiarity: Favorable to things that appear to be familiar Design Principle: Having consistent visuals and standards. Implementation: We will keep the format of the screen the same during the experiment. This way we won’t gain any undesired data from a surprise unfamiliar screen. Heuristics Affect: Emotions are affecting how we decide something Design Principle: Not including anything that is offensive or give an adverse emotion. Implementation: We have removed or omitted certain trivia questions because of some current events. We … Continue reading →

Hello friends, I am extremely happy!!! Yesterday during our test run of the trigger again, dots appeared in Biosemi. These dots were where the trigger was accessed and created markers on the EEG data. This will allow us to create markers based off of PsychoPy progress and will help sync the data between the two. I was excited enough that I did a heel click and then Aron followed in suit and did one. Best, Sophie

Hello Friends So, I have been busy this past week. Let’s break it down: Wednesday We had our MCA presentation on Wednesday, and it was kind of stressful. I am used to speaking in front of people, but I over think things and become anxious. Our presentation was about machine learning and self-driving cars. For the past two weeks we were learning about machine learning and the process around it. I enjoyed watching all of the presentations and thought they all were pretty interesting. This coming semester I have a machine learning and am very thankful for some background information into the subject. Thursday There were 8 of us that went to go see Inside Out 2, which was pretty … Continue reading →

For this assignment we are to design a study about smart phones and driving safety. I will be creating a study that will be quasi experiment. The study will be looking at phone usage and driving safety. The question is whether phone usage impacts the drivers’ chances of picking up their phones. I hypothesize that those with a higher phone usage will pick up their phones more while driving, compared to those who have lower phone usage. The experiment will have the participants fill out a survey about their phone usage throughout the day. In addition, we will take the average number of hours used on the phone during the past week to also determine whether they are heavy or … Continue reading →

Hello friends I swear I am alive, just went MIA from blogs. At least y’all aren’t asking for a proof of life (my mom has done that twice). Last Thursday for out extracurricular we watch Spirited Away. This is an anime movie about a young girl that gets swept into the spirit world and must work to save her parents. I won’t go too far into the plot, so I don’t spoil it. I have seen this movie before, so there weren’t any big surprises. The next day we were starting our deep dives. My deep dive is about machine learning. The plan is to create a model that will be able to drive a self-driving car. I haven’t done … Continue reading →

Hello all Yesterday we started to work in Unity. We were just moving the 3D models we made in Blender to Unity. Soon we will create animations. Today for our lecture we had Dr Eliot Winer, who is the director of VRAC and for the REU. He talked about his journey to where he is now and some of the research he has done. It was kind of nice to point out that our future isn’t a straight path. We might end up in industries we couldn’t fathom now. In addition, we had an another day with the EEG today. We have been working with the EEG to prepare for the real trials with our PsychoPy trivia questions. I have … Continue reading →

I am a big fan of wireless earbuds because they allow me to listen to music without having to have my phone on me at all times. With that being said, I do have some grievances with their design. I currently use JLAB Go Air Pop to listen to music. They do a great job for budget earbuds with music quality and connectivity, however, some of the touch functionalities are not the best. In order to change different settings such as volume, listening quality, and songs, you need to use the side of the earbuds. Each setting has a different tap pattern. My problem is if I accidentally bump the side of an earbud, it might pause the song or … Continue reading →

Howdy Y’all This week we have been doing a lot of 3D modeling. We started with Solidworks and Blender. I have really enjoyed Solidworks. We created 9 different parts and then assembled them, which is kind of tedious and kind of fun. Blender is interesting and is a little more complicated for me, but I am figuring it out. For example, we were supposed to make a cat for an activity, and instead I made a bat. Hopefully the cozy library I am planning on making will turn out better. Best, Sophie

Hello people, So, I realized I never posted my blog for Friday, so this one will be a longer post to cover the past 4 days. Thursday I said I would tell you more about the art walk and that is what this blog post is all about. So, the Art Walk was on Main Street and there were other shops with the art booths. At one of the shops, I was infatuated with a plush lobster that could also be used as a heating pad. I don’t know why, but the lobster made me so happy, and I ended up buying him. Meet Señor Lobster. We also explored a few other stores. There was a chocolate store that had … Continue reading →

Hello friends, Is it possible to drown in papers… Well not literally drowning, but it does feel like it right now. I am someone who loves to read books, but academic papers are a different concept all together. The research papers aren’t boring, but they are full of advance terminology and concepts that delve deep into the concept. Recently I was reading a paper about curiosity, and it explored the different definitions and theories that involved curiosity. In addition, I have been utilizing the recreational center here at Ames. Today post-workout, there was some rain while I was riding back to the apartments. Once the rain stopped, there was a magnificent rainbow and right above it was a second one. … Continue reading →

Hello all, This is my first blog post here at ISU. These past 2 weeks have been very hectic for me. Earlier, I was scrambling to find a summer job and was completely lost on what my plans were. Then, I get a call from an Ames number, some things fell into place, and now I am here. This past weekend was extremely fun. We went to Des Moines for brunch and an escape room. The escape room took place in this game room set and we had to find three keys to escape. I won’t go into further detail, so I don’t spoil the surprise, but long story short, we escaped. I also attempted to make Stroganoff for the … Continue reading →