A new day brings another faculty spotlight with it! Today’s spotlight is on Professor Douglas Zytko of our College of Innovation and Technology! Professor Zytko teaches classes in Human-computer interaction and Computer Ethics. He currently studies and designs computer-mediated consent to interpersonal behavior as a lens to prevent abuse online. Much of his research is dedicated to this area, and the areas of ethics that come about with it.
Doug, as he prefers, is dedicated to mentoring his students in the new areas of ethics that have arisen as technology marches forward. He is very passionate about engaging his students in the class material- one strategy of his to get them energized at the beginning of class is to start dancing to Metallica! He tends to work with his students in the lab on human-computer interaction quite a lot- you can find plenty of their work together published on his personal website, dougzytko.com. Many of his papers have received awards, the most recent of which was a Honorable Mention for Best Paper at CSCW‘s 2023 awards for his collaboration with Clemson University researchers on consent in VR! Professor Zytko finds working with his students to be the most rewarding part of his experiences here at UM-Flint.
“My favorite part of teaching at UMF has to be watching students go beyond the course material by participating in research.” Professor Zytko said, when asked about the subject.
This isn’t to say that teaching and research is all he does. When at home, Professor Zytko likes to jog and play with his pug.
The work that Professor Zytko does is an excellent example of the type of mentorship that UM-Flint can offer, and of the research that can be done here! Thank you for all that you do, Professor Zytko!