How does one become a postdoc? Part 1: My story.
I am a postdoc in human-computer interaction and digital health, but how did I come to this? How does one become a postdoc?
Short answer: "You get your PhD and stay to work in academia," but here is my long(er) answer. I share it to show that a path leading to academic research in human-computer interaction (HCI) can be very different, and mine wasn’t straight and smooth.
In my case, it starts from Russia. I am originally from Kazan, where I lived until I was 22. After school, I studied for a 5-year degree (the Russian equivalent of MA) in automation and control systems engineering, which back then I thought was computer science (it wasn't). Then, to be honest, I did not really understand the difference between high-level engineering and computer science. It was the most "computer science-like" specialization of the course, focusing on automated information processing and control systems, computer networks, and software for industrial systems. It included coding in object-oriented languages like C and Python, but also industrial safety courses, microprocessors, or chemistry, as the University specialized in the oil and gas industry. Luckily, my home region (Tatarstan republic) has them.
In Russia, I was very interested in academic research, but I also had very little understanding of what it is. I recently found my conference "publication" attempt (Analytic comparison of HTML4 and HTML5) and felt embarrassed, because I was so convinced that it should be accepted (of course it wasn't)! Reading it felt like reading your teenage diary if you know what I mean. Still, I desperately wanted to be involved and participated as an organizing committee member.
In 2012, I won an Erasmus Mundus grant to study computer science MA in Trento, Italy. I think I was convinced that I had a CS background, and I convinced the grant committee with my application as well. Only after I arrived at the University of Trento and saw a CS course curriculum, I realized that I have a close to nonexistent base for most of the CS courses, especially for subjects such as computability, computational complexity, or advanced logic. Needless to say, I spent most of my MA in the library, trying to catch up. It was a very hard lesson to be ok with feeling stupid and asking for help.
I got involved in a research project only towards the end of my Master's when I did an Internship at the Munich Innovation Group (MIG) startup. Retrospectively, it was an accidental opportunity, as I was hired to be a patent analyst. MIG had a research spin-off project with Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU) and a local orthopaedic clinic to test an innovative device detecting early stages of joint arthrosis in a noninvasive way. The device generated sound signals (vibroarthrography) produced by the knee movement, and my task was to create a tablet graphical user interface (GUI) to make the patient-doctor interaction during the diagnostic procedure more meaningful for patients. I had no background in medical imaging but the project sounded extremely interesting, I would have an opportunity to work with the research team and real patients and doctors, so I thought this task was a good CS MA Thesis topic. Besides the questions of detection accuracy and making sense of sound data in the Vibroarthrography project, there were lots of HCI-related topics we had to deal with, which made me interested in the field. In addition, the majority of the clinic patients were older adults, which made me include accessibility in the GUI specifications.
In 2015, I returned back to Trento and started a computer science PhD in accessible design, which later shifted to the digital health area. Read more about my PhD project here:
After the PhD, one can apply for a postdoc position, and I will tell you about that part in another post, stay tuned! Feel free to reach out if you have any questions!