Dominic Kao
Assistant Professor, Siebel School of Computing and Data Science
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Director, Virtual Futures Lab
I am an Assistant Professor in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. I study how the design of games, virtual reality, and other interactive systems shapes the people who use them: their motivation, engagement, sense of belonging, and performance.
A central thread of my work examines how avatar design features, including voice, self-similarity, and customization, change experience and behavior. My NSF CAREER award supports this line of research. I received my PhD from MIT in Computer Science, and before academia I worked as a game developer at Electronic Arts.
15+Experimental systems built
30,000+Study participants
13Invited talks
NSF CAREERAvatars and identity
Research
My research asks not only how interactive systems shape the people who use them, but how to design that influence on purpose. I design the experimental environments and lead their development, including educational and entertainment games, VR programming worlds, game-making software, avatar creators, and loot-box and online-meeting simulators. I run controlled experiments at scale.
Avatars and identity
How small choices in avatar design shape experience and performance.
Game feedback and motivation
Why the flashes and sounds games fire off for every action, often called "juicy" feedback, motivate players, and which psychological mechanisms actually explain it.
Virtual reality and instruction
Building immersive environments that teach, and studying how the demands of VR change the way people are guided through them.
Selected honors
- NSF CAREER Award2024
- Best Paper, ACM Transactions on Interactive Intelligent Systems2024
- Oral Presentation, NeurIPS2025
- Honorable Mention, ACM CHI2022
- Honorable Mention, ACM CHI PLAY2021
- Emerging Virtual Scholar Award, AERA ARIEL-SIG2017
ServiceAssociate Chair, ACM CHI (2022, 2023, 2025, 2026) and ACM CHI PLAY (2021, 2022).
Selected work
How Does Juicy Game Feedback Motivate? Testing Curiosity, Competence, and Effectance
Exploring How Gender-Anonymous Voice Avatars Influence Women's Performance in Online Computing Group Work
Audio Matters Too: How Audial Avatar Customization Enhances Visual Avatar Customization
The Effects of a Self-Similar Avatar Voice in Educational Games
Evaluating Tutorial-Based Instructions for Controllers in Virtual Reality Games
The Effects of Badges and Avatar Identification on Play and Making in Educational Games
Publications
Peer-reviewed papers, journal articles, and selected reports. My name is in bold.
2026
Game-Based and Gamified Robotics Education: A Comparative Systematic Review and Design Guidelines
Out of Control: Effects of Multimodal Self-Similarity on Embodiment During Autonomous Avatar Demonstrations in Virtual Reality
On the Intelligence and Knowledgeability of Virtual Agents
2025
PRIMT: Preference-Based Reinforcement Learning With Multimodal Feedback and Trajectory Synthesis From Foundation Models
Let's Do It My Way: Effects of Personality and Age of Virtual Characters
Towards Understanding the Impact of AI-Generated Visual and Vocal Self-Similarity on Avatar Identification, Motivation, and Engagement in Educational Games
A Systematic Review of Generative AI on Game Character Creation: Applications, Challenges, and Future Trends
Toward Understanding the Effects of Intelligence of a Virtual Character During an Immersive Jigsaw Puzzle Co-Solving Task
Design Considerations for Virtual Self-Representation in Educational Games
Exploring Player Agency in Educational Video Games
Exploring Content Integration in Educational Video Games
2024
How Does Juicy Game Feedback Motivate? Testing Curiosity, Competence, and Effectance
Exploring How Gender-Anonymous Voice Avatars Influence Women's Performance in Online Computing Group Work
Exploring the Effects of Self-Correction Behavior of an Intelligent Virtual Character During a Jigsaw Puzzle Co-Solving Task
AI-Based Automatic Detection of Online Teamwork Engagement in Higher Education
Collaborating With My Doppelgänger: The Effects of Self-Similar Appearance and Voice of a Virtual Character During a Jigsaw Puzzle Co-Solving Task
Impact of Tutorial Modes With Different Time Flow Rates in Virtual Reality Games
The Development and Validation of the Motivations for Avatar-Mediated Meetings (MAMM) Scale
Exploring the Influence of Avatar Skin Tone in VR Educational Games
Game Level Design to Evoke Spatial Exploration: The Influence of a Secondary Task
2023
Synthesizing Game Levels for Collaborative Gameplay in a Shared Virtual Environment
Effect of Frame Rate on User Experience, Performance, and Simulator Sickness in Virtual Reality
Exploring the Effect of the Group Size and Feedback of Non-Player Character Spectators in Virtual Reality Exergames
Effects of Speed of a Collocated Virtual Walker and Proximity Toward a Static Virtual Character on Avoidance Movement Behavior
Exploring the Appearance and Voice Mismatch of Virtual Characters
2022
Audio Matters Too: How Audial Avatar Customization Enhances Visual Avatar Customization
The Effects of Observation in Video Games: How Remote Observation Influences Player Experience, Motivation, and Behaviour
Emotional and Cognitive Effects of Learning With Computer Simulations and Computer Videogames
Exploring the Influence of Demographic Factors on Progression and Playtime in Educational Games
Procedural Game Level Design to Trigger Spatial Exploration
Zen Hanzi: A Game for Raising Hanzi Component Awareness
Exploring Relevance, Meaningfulness, and Perceived Learning in Entertainment Games
Towards an Educational Computing Career Exploration Game
Driving Interdisciplinary Collaboration Through Adapted Conjecture Mapping: A Case Study With the PECAS Mediator
2021
The Effects of a Self-Similar Avatar Voice in Educational Games
Evaluating Tutorial-Based Instructions for Controllers in Virtual Reality Games
Evaluating Virtual Reality Locomotion Interfaces on Collision Avoidance Task With a Virtual Character
Fighting COVID-19 at Purdue University: Design and Evaluation of a Game for Teaching COVID-19 Hygienic Best Practices
Toward Understanding Embodied Human-Virtual Character Interaction Through Virtual and Tactile Hugging
Toward Understanding the Effects of Virtual Character Appearance on Avoidance Movement Behavior
A Systematic Review of Literature on the Effectiveness of Intelligent Tutoring Systems in STEM
First-Year Exploratory Studies About Students' Career Decision Processes and the Impact of Data-Driven Decision Making
Not Very Effective: Validity Issues of the Effectance in Games Scale
2020
Exploring Help Facilities in Game-Making Software
The Effects of Juiciness in an Action RPG
Hack.VR: A Programming Game in Virtual Reality
Virtual Reality Racket Sports: Virtual Drills for Exercise and Training
Real and Virtual Environment Mismatching Induces Arousal and Alters Movement Behavior
Using Real-Time, In-Game Measures to Evaluate Game Difficulty
2019
Infinite Loot Box: A Platform for Simulating Video Game Loot Boxes
JavaStrike: A Java Programming Engine Embedded in Virtual Worlds
The Effects of Anthropomorphic Avatars vs. Non-Anthropomorphic Avatars in a Jumping Game
Exploring How Preference and Perceived Performance Vary in Different Game Genres Across Time of Day
Exploring the Effects of Growth Mindset Usernames in STEM Games
Toward Using Virtual Identities in Computer Science Learning for Broadening Participation
2018
The Effects of Badges and Avatar Identification on Play and Making in Educational Games
Exploring the Use of Virtual Identities for Broadening Participation in Computer Science Learning
Researching and Developing the Impacts of Virtual Identity on Computational Learning Environments
Embellishment & Effects: Seduction by Style
2017
Toward Understanding the Impact of Visual Themes and Embellishment on Performance, Engagement, and Self-Efficacy in Educational Games
MazeStar: A Platform for Studying Virtual Identity and Computer Science Education
2016
Exploring the Impact of Avatar Color on Game Experience in Educational Games
Exploring the Effects of Encouragement in Educational Games
Exploring the Effects of Dynamic Avatars on Performance and Engagement in Educational Games
Highlighting MazeStar: A Platform for Studying Avatar Use in Computer Science Learning Environments
Toward Understanding the Impacts of Role Model Avatars on Engagement in Computer Science Learning
2015
Toward Avatar Models to Enhance Performance and Engagement in Educational Games
Exigent: An Automatic Avatar Generation System
Mazzy: A STEM Learning Game
Toward Evaluating the Impacts of Virtual Identities on STEM Learning
Exploring the Impact of Role Model Avatars on Game Experience in Educational Games
Exploring the Use of Role Model Avatars in Educational Games
Toward Understanding Real-World Social Impacts of Avatars
Exploring Construction, Play, Use of Virtual Identities in STEM Learning
2014
Authoring Conversational Narratives in Games With the Chimeria Platform
The Chimeria Platform: User Empowerment Through Expressing Social Group Membership Phenomena
Stories of Stigma and Acceptance Using the Chimeria Platform
The Chimeria Platform: An Intelligent Narrative System for Modeling Social Identity-Related Experiences
2013
Computationally Modeling Narratives of Social Group Membership With the Chimeria System
The Living Liberia Fabric: An Interactive Narrative Artwork Memorializing Civil War in Liberia
2012
Reward Preference in Video Games
Invited talks
Universities that have hosted my research talks.
2025
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
IMMERSE Center for Immersive Computing
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Siebel School of Computing and Data Science
Northeastern University
College of Arts, Media and Design, and Computer Science
Rochester Institute of Technology
School of Interactive Games and Media
Queensland University of Technology
School of Computer Science
Michigan State University
Department of Media and Information
University of Arizona
College of Information Science
University of Utah
Division of Games
2024
National Taiwan University
Department of Computer Science
University of Victoria
Department of Computer Science
2019
Purdue University
Department of CIT
2018
University of California, Santa Cruz
Department of Computational Media
Purdue University
Department of CIT
Teaching
I teach human-computer interaction, with a focus on games and education, including XR.
HCI Applied to Games and Education
HCI Applied to Games and Education
Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming
Virtual Futures Lab
The lab works on HCI, games, and XR.
Postdoc
Swati Pandita
PhD students
Melissa Kronenberger
Olaoluwa Oyedokun
Syed Tanzim Mubarrat
Jiayi Liu
Lux Vijayan
Revan Ji
MS students
Olly Guo
Prospective students
I'm always glad to hear from prospective PhD and MS students interested in HCI, games, or XR. A short note about what you'd want to work on, and any related experience, tells me far more than a generic email.