Samantha Hautea

I am an interdisciplinary researcher who studies sociotechnical systems and digital culture: the beliefs, behaviors, artifacts, and infrastructures produced at the intersection of technology and people. My research interests include digital privacy, digital folklore, and trust, which I investigate using a mixture of qualitative and quantitative methods. My work at Michigan State University has looked at communicating trustworthiness, the role that sociotechnical systems like TikTok play in the creation of online discourse, and people's perceptions of systems that collect and repurpose their information. My dissertation work will focus on exploring people's perception of the ownership of digital objects. 

Prior to becoming a doctoral student in the Information and Media program, I was a communication specialist working in global development, science communication, and international policy. The underlying concerns with infrastructure and society in these fields are what continue to drive the questions that I find most compelling. To me, society and technology as concepts that are always in conversation, each perpetually constructing and reconstructing the other. I find it fascinating to think about human behavior and how the systems that we take for granted are enabling and constraining what we can perceive and make decisions about on a day to day basis. 

My goal is to do meaningful work that contributes to more equitable, accessible infrastructures that can support the rights and freedoms of everyone affected by our information society. I hope not only to help draw attention to the unintended effects of decisions about technology, but to also spark our collective imagination to envision how we might create a more inclusive world.