About
Welcome! I am Shashank Ahire, a PhD candidate at Leibniz University Hannover, under the supervision of Prof. Michael Rohs. My research focuses on developing conversational agents to enhance the health and well-being of knowledge workers. Unhealthy work habits in this demographic can lead to serious conditions like diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and chronic illnesses. I believe conversational agents can play a crucial role in providing proactive health reminders to combat issues like sedentary behavior, stress, and dehydration during work.
I completed my Master of Research (MRes) in Computing and Future Interaction Technologies at Swansea University, guided by Prof. Matt Jones. My master's research centered on "Designing a Smart Speaker for Emergent Users: Human-AI Symbiosis," addressing the challenges AI-powered smart speakers face in understanding emergent user requests. I implemented a Human-AI integration approach to enhance the responsiveness and efficiency of smart speakers for marginalized users in India.
Additionally, I spent 4.5 years as a Research Associate under Prof. Anirudha Joshi at IDC IIT Bombay. My research there focused on text input, accessibility, and emerging technologies. I've collaborated on research papers presented at various international conferences such as CHI, MobileHCI, INTERACT, and IndiaHCI.
I am also an active participant in the review process for conferences like CHI, CUI, IndiaHCI, and the IMWUT Journal.
Updates
in the Era of LLMs: Designing for Engagement, Privacy, and Wellbeing" at CUI2025
Publications
| WorkFit: Designing Proactive Voice Assistance for the Health and Well-Being of Knowledge Workers Shashank Ahire, Simon Benjamin, Michael Rohs CUI '24:Proceedings of the 6th ACM Conference on Conversational User Interfaces |
| Dual-Mode Interventions: Giving Agency to Knowledge Workers in Proactive Health Interventions Shashank Ahire, Saeid Othman, Michael Rohs CUI '24:Proceedings of the 6th ACM Conference on Conversational User Interfaces |
| Ubiquitous Work Assistant:Synchronizing a Stationary and a Wearable Conversational Agent to Assist Knowledge Work Shashank Ahire, Michael Rohs, Simon Benjamin CHIWORK '22: In Proceedings of Symposium on Human-Computer Interaction for Work |
| Designing a Smart Speaker for Emergent Users: Human Plus AI Response Shashank Ahire IndiaHCI '22: In Proceedings of the 13th Indian Conference on Human-Computer Interaction |
| How Compatible is Alexa for Dual-task? — Design Recommendations for Building Dual-task Compatible Intelligent Personal Assistance Shashank Ahire, Aaron Priegnitz, Oguz Önbas, Michael Rohs, Wolfgang Nejdl HAI '21: In Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction |
| Tired of Wake Words? Moving Towards Seamless Conversations with Intelligent Personal Assistants Shashank Ahire, Michael Rohs CUI '20: In Proceedings of the 2nd Conference on Conversational User Interfaces |
| Streetwise: Smart Speakers vs Human Help in Public Slum Settings Jennifer Pearson, Simon Robinson, Thomas Reitmaier, Matt Jones, Shashank Ahire, Anirudha Joshi, Deepak Sahoo, Nimish Maravi, Bhakti Bhikne CHI '19: In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
| Sustainabot – Exploring the Use of Everyday Foodstuffs as Output and Input for and with Emergent Users Honorable Mention award at CHI 2019 Simon Robinson, Jennifer Pearson, Mark D Holton, Shashank Ahire, Matt Jones CHI '19: In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
| Revisiting “Hole in the Wall Computing”: Private Smart Speakers and Public Slum Settings Simon Robinson, Jennifer Pearson, Shashank Ahire, Rini Ahirwar, Bhakti Bhikne, Nimish Maravi, Matt Jones CHI '18: In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
| Make Yourself at Phone: Reimagining Mobile Interaction Architectures With Emergent Users Simon Robinson, Jennifer Pearson, Thomas Reitmaier, Shashank Ahire, Matt Jones CHI '18: In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
| Performance of Accessible Indic Gesture-based Keyboard Best paper award at Interact 2017 Pabba Anu Bharath, Charudatta Jadhav, Shashank Ahire, Manjiri Joshi, Rini Ahirwar, Anirudha Joshi Interact '17: IFIP Conference on Human-Computer Interaction |
| Chameleon Devices: Investigating More Secure and Discreet Mobile Interactions via Active Camouflaging Honorable Mention award at CHI 2017 Jennifer Pearson, Simon Robinson, Matt Jones, Anirudha Joshi, Shashank Ahire, Deepak Sahoo, Sriram Subramanian CHI '17 Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
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Does prediction really help in Marathi text input?: empirical analysis of a longitudinal study Girish Dalvi, Shashank Ahire, Nagraj Emmadi, Manjiri Joshi, Anirudha Joshi, Sanjay Ghosh, Prasad Ghone, Narendra Parmar MobileHCI '16: Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction with Mobile Devices and Services |
| Shift+Tap or Tap+LongPress?: The Upper Bound of Typing Speed on InScript Sanjay Ghosh, Anirudha Joshi, Manjiri Joshi, Nagraj Emmadi, Girish Dalvi, Shashank Ahire, Swati Rangale CHI '17: Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
| A Protocol to Evaluate Virtual Keyboards for Indian Languages Best paper award IndiaHCI 2015 Girish Dalvi, Shashank Ahire, Nagraj Emmadi, Manjiri Joshi, Nirav Malsettar, Debasis Samanta, Devendra Jalihal, Anirudha Joshi IndiaHCI'15: Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on HCI, IndiaHCI 2015 |
| Interaction design for Indian needs lab, IIT Bombay Shashank Ahire, Girish Dalvi, Manjiri Joshi, Anirudha Joshi Interactions: Volume 22 Issue 5, September-October 2015 |
| Better Together: Disaggregating Mobile Services for Emergent Users Simon Robinson, Jennifer Pearson, Matt Jones, Anirudha Joshi, Shashank Ahire MobileHCI '17: Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction with Mobile Devices and Services |
| Media player for Semi-illiterate users Shashank Ahire, Charudatt Surve, Bharat Prajapati, Yogesh Parulekar IndiaHCI '14: Proceedings of the India HCI 2014 Conference on Human Computer Interaction |