Summer Conclusion

This summer has been a survey of the different parts of research. In this post I will review some of the topics covered in blog posts thus far. I will reflect on them as a cumulative experience and share how they have impacted my views on research and my thoughts about my own research capabilities.

Starting out, my four main goals were as follows: 1. To be able to articulate what research looks like in the realm of data visualization. 2. To learn new technical skills and gain exposure to data visualization tools. 3. Learn how a dataset is curated and gain confidence working with datasets. 4. Learn how the agile process can be applied to research. I feel like I completed these goals, and learned about my own research interests in the process.

• I learned a workflow for data visualization research, outlined in more detail in our technical paper. This learning reinforced the idea of literature and learning best practices as being crucial in data visualization research, and likely in many other fields of research as well.

• To address the second goal, I was able to learn some new technical skills, working in observable notebook. Working on this, I learned that as far as computer science research goes, I prefer to work in a field where I am already technically comfortable. The learning curve was so steep for me that I felt like I spent the whole time catching up. I imagine this would have been different if I was working in an environment where I was already comfortable. I did, on the other hand, enjoy all the writing components.

• As far as the third component, learning about dataset curation, I had a lot of fun in this phase of the project because I was able to explore the dataset, which inspires much of the motivation behind the project.

• The fourth goal, learning about scrum, we began early on in the summer and were able to practices the principals from it for the rest of the project.

Some questions I asked myself in the first week were do I want to do research? do I understand how one does research? I now feel equipped to ask better, more insightful research questions, and conduct original research in computer science. I am interested in conducting research in general, but still curious about what research looks like when applied to different disciplines.