UX and Games Researcher based in Seattle. Recently at Meta Reality Labs, now ready for a new role.
Intro
I finished my PhD in Cognitive Psychology in 2020, researching how games communicate abstract concepts to their players. In my dissertation, I demonstrated how little black squares moving away from the player’s little black square makes the player lonelier if they are aware of a metaphorical connection between affection and proximity.
Player appraching other squares (trying to make friends)
Other squares scattering when player gets close (rejection)
Work
I most recently worked at Meta Reality Labs, working on smart glasses software and hardware research teams. I’ve also worked with Quantic Foundry, writing and analyzing surveys about gaming during the Covid-19 pandemic and virtual reality, which I’ve written about here. I was a UX Research intern at Google in 2019 working on cloud computing services, I’ve written up a case study here.
Skills
Research
Designing and conducting studies to help improve user experiences with interactive media, cloud platforms, and websites
Analysis
Analyzing quantitative and qualitative data to make inferences about causal and predictive relationships between variables
Communication
Producing compelling presentations and concise reports to communicate research findings to diverse audiences
Publications
Karzmark, C. R. (2020). Lonely or Just Distant? The Role of Interpretation in the Emotional Impact of a Metaphorical Game. UC Santa Cruz. ProQuest ID: Karzmark_ucsc_0036E_12066. Merritt ID: ark:/13030/m5vb3jqr. Retrieved from https://escholarship.org/uc/item/90b42276
Anderson, B. A., Karzmark, C. R., Wardrip-Fruin, N. (2020). We Don’t Play As We Think, But We Think As We Play: Evidence for the Psychological Impact of In-Game Actions. Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games.
Anderson, B. A., Karzmark, C. R., Wardrip-Fruin, N. (2019). The Psychological Reality of Procedural Rhetoric. Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games.
Gibbs, W. R., Samermit, P., Karzmark, C. R. (2018). Humor, Irony, and the Body. Review of Cognitive Linguistics, 16:1, 72-97.
Riès, S. K., Karzmark, C. R., Navarrete, E., Knight, R. T., & Dronkers, N. F. (2015). Specifying the role of the left prefrontal cortex in word selection. Brain and Language, 149, 135-147.
Presentations
Anderson, B. A., Karzmark, C. R., Wardrip-Fruin, N. (2020). We Don’t Play As We Think, But We Think As We Play: Evidence for the Psychological Impact of In-Game Actions. Presented at the 15th Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games, Bugibba, Malta.
Karzmark, C. R. (2020). Lonely or Just Distant? Does Awareness of Metaphor Affect Emotional Impact of Computer Games? Presented at the 13th Annual International Conference of the Association for Researching and Applying Metaphor, Hamar, Norway.
Anderson, B. A., Karzmark, C. R., Wardrip-Fruin, N. (2019). The Psychological Reality of Procedural Rhetoric. Presented at 14th Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games, San Luis Obispo, California.
Karzmark, C. R. (2019). Lonely or Just Distant? Metaphorical Communication in Flashgames. Presented at 4th Annual Google UXR Intern Summit, San Francisco, California.
Karzmark, C. R., Lam, L. D., Pais, Z. B., Tetreault, L. (2018). Player’s Interpretations of a Metaphorical Video Game. Presented at the 12th Annual International Conference of the Association for Researching and Applying Metaphor, Hong Kong, SAR, China.
Karzmark, C. R. (2017). Playing it Forward: Virtual Motion as a Metaphorical Prime. Presented at the 6th Special Meeting of the Association for Researching and Applying Metaphor, Odense, Denmark.
Karzmark, C. R., Gibbs, W. R. (2016). Encrypting Humor in Metaphor: Cupcakes and Ho-Hos. Presented at the 4th Meeting of Linguistic Approaches to Funniness, Amusement, and Laughter, Łódź, Poland.
Karzmark, C. R. (2015). Metaphor in Video Games. Presented at Crown Social Fiction Conference, Santa Cruz, California.