Sofia is Senior Lecturer in Applied IT with specialization in Educational Sciences at the division of Learning, Communication and IT. She holds a PhD in the same subject from the University of Gothenburg, as well as a Master of Education in English and Learning and ICT. She previously worked at University West as research assistant in Child–Robot Interaction while carrying out a post doc in Interaction Design at Chalmers University of Technology.
Sofia conducts research within Human–Robot Interaction, Educational Science, Ethics, Interaction Design and Participatory Design. Her research interest concerns the use of robot technology in education, especially humanoid robots featuring as pedagogical tools in different ways, e.g., as tutors or teachable agents. Specifically, her research focuses on children’s interactions with robots, e.g., social interaction and breakdown situations, but also ethical dilemmas concerning the use of robots in education from the perspective of teachers and students. Sofia has also conducted research on the design of digital services for public libraries. The research has primarily been conducted as part of international research projects.
She is currently the guest editor of the special issue Critical Robotics Research for the journal AI & SOCIETY. In addition to some other scientific review for journals and conferences, Sofia is review editor for the journal Frontiers in Robotics and AI, part of the editorial board of the British Journal of Educational Technology, and publication chair of the International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction (HAI).
Sofia currently teaches within the magister-program Learning, Communication and IT, where she is responsible for the degree project course and teaches in the method course. Her work includes supervision of doctoral students and students in IT and learning at the University of Gothenburg - previously also in interaction design at Chalmers. She has also taught at upper secondary levels.
Research projects
Research groups
Media and outreach
Sofia’s research on robots has received coverage in different media outlets such as TV4, Swedish Radio (P1, P3, P4, and Radio Sweden), GP, Metro, NyTeknik, and ScienceNews. She has also appeared in different magazines, blogs, and podcasts, such as Skolvärlden, Skolporten, Meet the Education Researcher, Föräldrakraft, Skolsnack, Omvärldsbloggen and the IT faculty magazine, as well as been interviewed and authored research reports for the Swedish National Agency for Education. She has also participated in events such as Framtidens lärande, Almedalsveckan, SETT Syd, Internetdagarna, the BETT Show, Särskolans rikskonferens, Café å lär, and RobotWeek, and conducted guest lectures at universities in Sweden and Finland. In 2017, her research was named one of the year's best advances in research and technology by the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA) – see video here.
