Caitlin Barta

Background

About Caitlin Barta

As a UX Researcher with 10 years of experience, I'm passionate about making a positive impact on people's happiness & health by helping organizations understand the needs, goals, and obstacles of the people they're designing products and experiences for. While working on YouTube Shorts, I conducted multi-phase research on short-form video creators' needs related to motivation & money to inform decision-making across YouTube teams focused on rewards & monetization. I was also a representative for the Women@ ERG on YouTube's Inclusion Working Group from 2021-2022. Prior to working on Shorts, I led remote & in-person field research on YouTube users' needs related to offline usage & data saving in the US, Indonesia, and Brazil. I also conducted research for YouTube projects touching audio-focused and 2-in-1 device experiences and cowrote a paper for IMX 2021. As a UX Researcher at NerdWallet from 2017-2018, I conducted research on home & auto ownership, home buying, and credit card shopping as part of our efforts to make people's money do more for them. From mid-2013 to 2017, I was a User Experience Researcher at Facebook. I conducted foundational and iterative design research on Facebook Events as well as for a number of experimental products, such as assistive updates to the notifications tab, social awareness features in the chat sidebar, a map check-ins related experience, and more. I graduated in May 2013 from the University of Michigan with a Master of Science in Information and a specialization in Human-computer interaction (HCI). I received my Bachelor of Science in 2011 in Computer Science, with a specialization in Human-computer Interaction.