The Aphasia Recovery Lab at Purdue University's Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences focuses on rehabilitation and recovery for persons with aphasia, namely stroke survivors. As an undergraduate research assistant, I am involved with two ongoing projects: story-based sentence treatment for aphasia recovery, and a tDCS pilot study for healthy participants. This opportunity has given me valuable experience, which I can and have applied to UX.
For one, experience in the formal research process has been invaluable as a background to conducting UX research. Working with real patients and healthy participants in data collection sessions and designing stimuli with very specific conditions and people in mind has helped me consider how to specify my designs—not just create something that looks pretty or works for me. Some of our stories didn't work in our initial training—teaching me about the iteration process.
In addition, working in a professional environment has meaningly strenghtened my soft skills. The lab's weekly meetings, collaborative and hierarchical leadership structure, and opportunity to learn from and train others has given me confidence in entering the professional workforce.
As this project is ongoing and under strict IRB / HIPAA protocol, I cannot share specific details or data from either study at this time. Check back later for publication links!
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