Lisa Vangsness

Background

About Lisa Vangsness

We've all triumphed over difficult tasks and been stopped in our tracks by others. How do we know which tasks will be hard for us or others? How does this knowledge affect our subsequent decisions? My work is both basic and translational: I want to know how the human mind assesses task difficulty (basic research) and how this assessment affects people's engagement in real-world settings (e.g, human-automation teams, academic procrastination). I use these research findings to develop interactive demonstrations and static visualizations that help people make more accurate judgments and decisions. This work is embedded in a community setting: I engage in outreach efforts and work to involve the public in all stages of the research process. This approach allows me to share my expertise with the greatest impact: I identify opportunities for growth and offer recommendations and tools to address their underlying causes. When I'm not in the lab, I teach advanced statistics to our Masters and PhD students and enjoy agility training with my dog.