Sabina Beganovic

An innovative role, where I use my research skills and understanding of behavioural science to produce design research in an ethical and culturally sensitive way to ensure Sightsavers design team produces the most culturally sensitive interventions that speak to people

• Developing tools to support a social and behaviour change approach, more closely tied to research
• Providing innovation by bringing in human-centred design tools that can be used to gather insightful insights, closely tied to community.
• Conducting qualitative research to funnel effective prototype iteration for the design team of Sightsavers
• Participated in field research and workshops in East Africa.

My main focus involved developing behavioural and cultural insights for projects on the multisensory devices team, a research group at UCL collaborating with industry partners at the intersection of consumer, technology, and psychology research.

• Analysing longitudinal qualitative data for a digital health project looking at smell impairments.
• Co-author of a Farfalla funded project investigating an educative, sustainability virtual reality experience (contributions involve qualitative analysis).
• Co-author of a SONY funded project using virtual reality to explore taste multisensory experiences.
• Conducted extensive literature reviews, such as on a cross-cultural smell project comparing Japan and the UK.

• Working closely with the speech and language therapist to implement tactile activities that support socio-emotional learning.
• Facilitated group activities to promote social interaction among SEN students.

My first research opportunity, awarded in recognition of my extensive literature reviews I conducted independently for a mental health module. This project investigated the symptoms of schizophrenia using a virtual reality gambling task.

• Responsible for data collection. This involved scheduling participants and gathering data using the virtual reality Oculus set. I gathered data for over 80 participants.
• Had the opportunity to learn from the quantitative analysis on this project.