Cognition and Visualization (CAV) Lab

About CAV Lab

We are the Cognition & Visualization Lab at Emory. We aim to facilitate effective data exploration and decision making by quantifying potential human or algorithmic biases and designing interfaces that will promote user reflection. Current and prospective students in the CAV Lab can check out the lab manual for information on lab culture and expectations.

If you are interested in working with our lab, please contact us.

Recent News

Upcoming Papers @ VIS 2026

November 2026. Thomas Davidson will present his paper Charting the Immersive Self: A Scoping Review of Immersive Personal Visualisation; Mengyu Chen will present her paper Less Is More Reflective: Intervention Intensity and Metacognitive Disruption in Visual Analytics; Shiyao Li will present his paper Confirmation Bias Shapes Outlier Identification and Removal in Data Cleaning with Scatterplots and Sung Oh will present his workshop paper Levels of AI Autonomy and Analyst Control for Bias Mitigation Interventions in Visual Analytics at VIS 2026!

Recent Alumni

Sep 2026. Join us in celebrating our newest lab alum, Dr. Shiyao Li! It has been a joy working alongside him, and we wish him the absolute best as he takes on his new role as a Data Scientist at Home Depot. Congratulations, Shiyao!

Upcoming Ph.D. Student

August 2026. We are excited to welcome Sung Oh to CAV-Lab as an incoming Ph.D. student! Sung Oh joins us from Virginia Tech and will be researching visual analytics and human-computer interaction. Welcome to the team, Sung!

Mengyu Chen passes her Ph.D. prospectus!

Sep 2026. Mengyu Chen passed her dissertation prospectus, detailing her ongoing thesis work on integrating metacognition with visualization. Congratulations on this major milestone, Mengyu!

People

Emily Wall, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor
visual analytics; decision making; cat lady; puzzle connoisseur;
Scholar

Thomas Davidson

Ph.D. Candidate
personal data vis; info vis; distributed tracing; running; ch ess;
Scholar

Mengyu (Bonnie) Chen

Ph.D. Candidate
visual analytics; human behavior; bookworm; dog person;
Scholar

Sung Oh

Ph.D. Student
visual analytics; information visualization; coffee; traveling
Scholar

Sunghyun Kim

Ph.D. Student
data Physicalization; IoT; dog person; rugby

Mandy Sun

Undergraduate Student
computer science; craft-hci; painter; rock climber; sewist

Alumni

Shiyao Li

decision making; bias detection; Hearthstone; cat food researcher;
Now: Data Scientist @ Home Depot

Yanan Da

info vis; human bias; decision making; lego; puzzle; restaurants; workout;
Now: Founding Engineer @ Akify

Ziwei Dong

data visualization; machine learning interpretability; board gamer; badminton fan; Now: Applied Scientist @ Amazon

Keke Wu, Ph.D.

storytelling; cognitively accessible data visualizations;
Now: Assistant Professor @ University of Maryland, College Park

Ben Altschuler

social nlp; info vis; human bias; avid surfer; pro smoothie maker;

Zhou (Serena) Fang

topic modeling visualizations for literature review
Now: M.S. Biomedical Informatics @ Harvard

Shrey Gupta

(co-advised by Avani Wildani)
data viz; decision making; transfer/meta-learning; amateur runner; self-proclaimed humorist;

Audrey Bu

Undergraduate Student
Mathematics and Data Science; Data Vis; Cooking; Travel; Coffee

Molly Han

Undergraduate Student
data science; cognitive psyc & nbb; multilingual; matcha enthusiast; pup lover

Robert Jarman

Undergraduate Student
Computer Science & Business; Student Ambassador; Outdoor Emory Exec Member & Trip Leader

Ethan Lee

Undergraduate Student
computer science & psychology; web development; guitarist; basketball

Daisy Wang

Undergraduate Student
computer science; software development; dancing; traveling

Daiwei Wang

Undergraduate Student
quantitative science; econ & anthro; film & photography

Andrew Yang

Undergraduate Student
psychology; decision making; startup; travel; cafe-hopping

Aiden Min

Undergraduate Student
visual analytics; violinist; dried mango lover; 76ers fan; comp sci & business

Bella Li

computing & critical design theories; phil & lit; random spotify playlists generation; weightlifting; sarcasm overload

Yiping (Jessie) Liang

data visualization; design & psychology lover; super fan of massage; used to go to gym everyday;

Yijun Liu

Sociology and Computing; UI Design; Professional baker for friends' birthdays

Randy Truong

interaction design; info vis; bridging subjectivity & objectivity; visual artist; friend;
Now: Pacific Northwest National Lab in Seattle, WA

Zhongzheng Xu

UX-design; psychology & sociology lover; vimer; owner of two cats; barista

Julietta Zhu

Psychology and Economics; UI/UX Design; Entrepreneurship; Visual Art

Pets

Alvin

Amiens

Bagel

Hi! My name is Shan Cai but I go by Cai mostly. I am a full moon betta fish and just a few month old in human years. Unlike my sister Coffee, I am a picky eater who only chew on smaller pellets and rather stay hungry than eating anything larger than my mouth.

Cai

Coffee

Ellarie

Juven

Kakashi Sensei

Moon

Niki

Nora

Pet Alumni

Cat

Contact

Interest form