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Inspired by the concepts of diminishing reality and ad-blocking in browsers, this study investigates the perceived benefits and concerns of blocking physical, real-world content, particularly ads, through Extended Reality (XR). To understand how users perceive this concept, we first conducted a user study (N=18) with an ad-blocking prototype to gather initial insights. The results revealed a mixed willingness to adopt XR blockers, with participants appreciating aspects such as customizability, convenience, and privacy. Expected benefits included enhanced focus and reduced stress, while concerns centered on missing important information and increased feelings of isolation. Hence, we investigated the user acceptance of different ad-blocking visualizations through a follow-up online survey (N=120), comparing six concepts based on related work. The results indicated that the XR ad-blocker visualizations play a significant role in how and for what kinds of advertisements such a concept might be used, paving the path for future feedback-driven prototyping.

Christopher Katins, Jannis Strecker, Jan Hinrichs, Pascal Knierim, Bastian Pfleging, and Thomas Kosch. 2025. Ad-Blocked Reality: Evaluating User Perceptions of Content Blocking Concepts Using Extended Reality. In CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '25), April 26–May 01, 2025, Yokohama, Japan. ACM, New York, NY, USA, 18 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3706598.3713230

Technological advancements, particularly in artificial intelligence, significantly transform our society and work practices. Computational thinking (CT) has emerged as a crucial 21-century skill, enabling individuals to solve problems more effectively through an automation-oriented perspective and fundamental concepts of computer science. To ensure the effective integration of CT into educational curricula, it is crucial to develop efficient assessment frameworks that allow teachers to measure and promote student CT proficiency. Therefore, our aim is to develop a short test to measure CT among undergraduate students. To this end, we consider two performance tests: the Computational Thinking test (CTt) and the Algorithmic Thinking Test for Adults (ATTA). We use items from both instruments to compile a short test. Based on a sample of 290 second-year non-computer science undergraduate students, we provide evidence on the quality of our test. Besides classical test theory, we apply item response theory, namely Rasch modeling, and confirmatory factor analysis. Our test shows favorable properties, e.g., Cronbach's alpha > .75, and may be suitable for the efficient assessment of CT across higher education programs.

Josef Guggemos, Roman Rietsche, Stephan Aier, Jannis Strecker and Simon Mayer. 2024. Measuring Computational Thinking - Developing A Short Performance Test For Higher Education. In Proceedings of the 21st International Conference on Cognition and Exploratory Learning in Digital Age (CELDA 2024), October 26-28, Zabreg, Croatia.

Social media platforms play a significant role in shaping public opinion and societal norms. Understanding this influence requires examining the diversity of content that users are exposed to. However, studying filter bubbles in social media recommender systems has proven challenging, despite extensive research in this area. In this work, we introduce SOAP (System for Observing and Analyzing Posts), a novel system designed to collect and analyze very large online platforms (VLOPs) data to study filter bubbles at scale. Our methodology aligns with established definitions and frameworks, allowing us to comprehensively explore and log filter bubbles data. From an input prompt referring to a topic, our system is capable of creating and navigating filter bubbles using a multimodal LLM. We demonstrate SOAP by creating three distinct filter bubbles in the feed of social media users, revealing a significant decline in topic diversity as fast as in 60min of scrolling. Furthermore, we validate the LLM analysis of posts through an inter-and intra-reliability testing. Finally, we open source SOAP as a robust tool for facilitating further empirical studies on filter bubbles in social media.

Luka Bekavac, Kimberly Garcia, Jannis Strecker, Simon Mayer, and Aurelia Tamò-Larrieux. 2024. From Walls to Windows: Creating Transparency to Understand Filter Bubbles in Social Media. In NORMalize 2024: The Second Workshop on the Normative Design and Evaluation of Recommender Systems. 12 pages.