My goal for my research is to discover early biomarkers of autism so that every child can reach their full potential. I hope that it’s going to be standard of care that most children with autism are identified between 12 and 24 months.Prof. Dr. Karen Pierce, Professor, Department of Neuroscience, UC San Diego and Co-director, UCSD Autism Center of Excellence
At Tobii, we foster an inclusive environment that uplifts diverse voices. Join us on International Day of Women and Girls in Science as we highlight influential scientists in eye tracking research.
The significance and impact of eye tracking-based research cannot be overstated. It has empowered us to screen for early signs of autism, capture the vital signs in comatose patients, and build better programming tools and processes with invaluable insights provided by eye tracking research. These and many other milestones in research owe a great deal to the impactful contributions of powerful women and girls in science.
Although women have made immense progress toward increasing their participation and leadership in science, a significant gender gap persists at all levels of science.
International Women and Girls in Science Day presents a pivotal opportunity to promote equal access to science for women and girls and celebrate their achievements.
Let’s dive deeper into the remarkable work of women scientists leading eye tracking research.
Prof. Dr. Karen Pierce devotes her research to improving Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) diagnosis and treatment. Her early ASD detection approach has identified several thousand ASD toddlers around their first birthday, allowing them rapid treatment access.
Watch the full interview to hear directly from Prof. Pierce about her visionary work.
In her latest research work, Prof. Dr. Karen Pierce and her colleagues found that children’s lack of attention to motherese (so-called ”baby talk”) can aid early ASD detection. In their study, children were shown a motherese video alongside a distracting one (noisy traffic and geometric shapes with a sound). The researchers concluded that if a child spends over 70% of the test focusing on stimuli other than the motherese, it could signal a need for immediate attention, especially for those with ASD.
Dr. Bonita Sharif directs the Software Engineering Research and Empirical Studies Lab at UNL, which works toward understanding developers’ attention and cognitive processes when writing or evaluating code. Her research findings ultimately help build better programming interfaces and support all software team members.
I like to study how professional developers, as well as students’ work. What separates, for example, an expert from a novice? When does a novice become an expert? When is that “Aha” moment that a novice becomes an expert in whatever their field is?Dr. Bonita Sharif, Ph.D., Associate Professor, School of Computing, University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Dr. Bonita Sharif's work focuses on various software development aspects, including but not limited to empirical software engineering, program comprehension, emotional awareness, software traceability, and software visualization to support the maintenance of large systems.
Watch the full interview to gain valuable insights directly from Dr. Sharif herself.
Prof. Dr. Nivedita Mani’s lab studies the language learning process in children as young as six months. In her work, word learning is viewed as the result of a dynamic mutual interaction between the environment and the learner, focusing on the learner, what they know, what they are interested in, and their motivation to learn.
We describe language acquisition as the result of a dynamic mutual interaction between the child and the environment. And our overarching goal is to identify what the dynamics are in this interaction. How do child and the environment go through this dance, that we believe they have to, as the child learns language? At what point does the environment come in, and how does the child come in and shape the environment, and how do they mutually shape one another?Prof. Dr. Nivedita Mani, Professor of Psychology of Language, Georg-August University of Goettingen
Watch the full interview to hear directly from Prof. Mani about her work toward unraveling the intricacies of language acquisition.
In the latest research from Prof. Dr. Nivedita Mani’s lab, the team explored how learning a language as a toddler relates to emotional states, such as curiosity. The study results revealed that children who are more engaged while learning new words are better at remembering them. The scientists suggest that curiosity-driven language learning is naturally rewarding and helps retain information for the long term.
Gabriela is a researcher with the Hacking Consciousness Lab, where she investigates novel biomarkers of consciousness with Dr. Ayham Alkhachroum, principal investigator. In the lab, Gabriela develops experimental protocols, coordinates with multi-disciplinary and multi-center teams, and participates in data analysis. She is also a fourth-year medical student at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and has written several scientific abstracts and manuscripts.
In her latest research study, Gabriela and her colleagues used
Tobii Pro eye tracking glasses to assess comatose patients’ responsiveness and compare the outcomes to standard bedside clinical examinations. The research results have shown that comatose patients’ eye tracking response can be sensitively detected using eye tracking glasses, while the standard examination might miss some subtle signs of consciousness.
About gender equality at Tobii
Tobii has a comprehensive Diversity and Inclusion program in place and actively works with several initiatives to be a diverse and inclusive organization. In 2023, Tobii was recognized as one of Sweden’s most gender-equal companies (Allbright report). More than 360 companies were reviewed, and to be placed on the green list requires an equal gender distribution (40/60) in the company’s management.
Related content
blog
How eye tracking can inform discipline based educational research
Dr. Jessica VandenPlas explores how eye tracking research is helping to provide a better understanding of how students learn chemistry concepts and improve methods of education.
Webinars
Eye tracking solutions to precipitate understanding in chemistry
Dr. Jessica VandenPlas introduces the unique research challenges faced by chemistry education researchers, highlighting the role that eye tracking can play in addressing these difficulties. Examples is given from her own research program, including student use of multiple representations in organic chemistry and the use of animations and simulations in general chemistry.
Webinars
Eye tracking research symposium: Autism across the human lifespan
An online symposium where three esteemed researchers present their work with eye tracking in the field of autism study.
Subscribe to our blog
Subscribe to our stories about how people are using eye tracking and attention computing.