Austin Toombs

I lead the Community-Computer Interaction Lab (C-CIL). 

I have previously been:

• an Assistant Professor at Purdue University
• an external research collaborator with Facebook
• a postdoc (Research Associate) at Open Lab within Newcastle University
• a PhD student studying Informatics in the School of Informatics and Computing at Indiana University, with a minor in Inquiry Methodology.
• a Master's student studying Human Computer Interaction Design at Indiana University.
• a Bachelor of Science student studying Computer Science at Ball State University, with a minor in Mathematics.

My research interests center on the impact that digital technologies have on how communities are formed and maintained. I am particularly interested in how certain kinds of relationships between individuals within a community are encouraged while others are discouraged, and how various technologies are used to implicitly enforce these distinctions. How interpersonal relationships are sanctioned (in both senses of the word) plays a vital role in the inclusivity, welcomeness, and diversity of a community.

• Communities of Practice
• Computer Mediated Communication and Social Media
• Computing, Culture, and Society
• Ethics and Values in Digital Society
• HCI@Luddy
• Human Computer Interaction
• Human Computer Interaction and Design
• Online communities
• Social Informatics
• Social Media