Exploring how humans use technology to think and create
I’m Peter Dalsgaard, Professor of Interaction Design at Aarhus University. I explore digital technologies from a human-centered perspective with a focus on how humans use technology to think and create in new ways. I develop theories to understand these processes, collaborate with external partners in industry and public organisations to study real-life cases, and co-develop new digital tools and systems to gain new knowledge about their implications in practice.
My profiles: Aarhus University | Google Scholar | Twitter | Linkedin. Contact: +45 20652942 | dalsgaard@cavi.au.dk
News and recent publications
[Sep 16] New paper at ECCE’26: The Generation Effect and AI-Assisted Writing: Towards a Framework of Cognitive Fidelity.
[Sep 16] New paper at ECCE’26: The Generation Effect and AI-Assisted Writing: Towards a Framework of Cognitive Fidelity.
[Aug 01]: Paper accepted for NordiCHI’26: Combinatorial Capture: Generative AI and the Displacement of Transformational Creative Work
[May 10] Co-organizing a workshop at CHI’26: Tools for thought: Understanding, protecting, and augmenting human cognition with generative AI.
[June 15] New paper at the Participatory Design Conference: Enacting utopias: A participatory design approach to AI.
[January 10] New book out, simply titled AI. More info here.
[Sep 10]: Keynote at VIA Research Days 2025: Working Creatively with Machines.
[Dec 01 ]: New paper at IASDR 2025: Peter Dalsgaard, 2025. Designing for Ethical Friction: Reclaiming Agency and Accountability in AI-Supported Creativity.
[Dec 01]: New paper at IASDR 2025: Peter Dalsgaard, 2025. Scaffolding Metacognition in Design with Generative AI Tools. (Best paper award 🏅)
[Dec 01: New paper at: Peter Dalsgaard, 2025. How Interaction Modalities Influence Academic Co-Writing with Generative Artificial Intelligence.
Selected projects
CoCreate
Studying the benefits and shortcomings of digital tools used in collaborative creative work. Read more on the project website.
Managing Ideas in Creative Work
Examining the role and nature of tools that designers use to capture, manage, and develop ideas, specifically in the domain of design. Read more on the project website.
Reinvent
Creating a participatory platform for communities to develop, discuss and present best- practice examples of solutions for how to rethink society after the COVID-19 lockdown. Read more on the project website.
PLACED
Developing digital services to help libraries transform into vibrant urban innovation hubs by supporting knowledge creation activities among citizens and turning this knowledge into an ever-growing part of the urban community’s shared resources. Read more on the project website
Experimenting, Experiencing, Reflecting
A collaboration between science and art led to examine perception, decision-making, action, notions of togetherness, collaboration, and the transmission of knowledge. Read more on the project website
Human-Centered Information Spaces
Envisioning a future in which the existing world of documents and applications is linked to multiscale personalized information spaces that behave in accordance with the context and history of activity. Read more on the project website
Short bio
Full professor of Interaction Design at Aarhus University.
Founder and co-director of the Centre for Digital Creativity.
Currently principal investigator of the projects CoCreate, PLACED, Creative Tools, and Reinvent.
My profiles elsewhere: Aarhus University | Google Scholar | Twitter | Linkedin
Contact: dalsgaard@cavi.au.dk
For prospective students
I am currently accepting new Masters and PhD students, particularly in the topics of interaction design, digital tools in creativity and innovation, participatory design, design processes, and the interplay between digital and physical phenomena in Human-Computer Interaction. Please email me at dalsgaard[at]cavi.au.dk, sending a CV and a project outline, if you’re interested in supervision or mentoring, possibly in connection to one of our current projects