Research

Most aviation accidents are caused by human error. Human factors, such as eyesight, fatigue, decision-making, all pose challenges to air travel safety. Leveraging institutional strength in psychology, kinesiology and vision science, research members of the University’s new Waterloo Institute for Sustainable Aeronautics (WISA) are working to offer evidence-based solutions to reduce pilot error.

Most of us experience the world in two different states of mind. In one, we're attentive and focused on what we’re doing, and in the other we wander through our mental landscape. These states of mind wandering occur 30 to 50 per cent of our daily lives says Dr. Effie Pereira, the inaugural Lupina Foundation Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Faculty of Arts.

The Department of English faculty boasts an impressive group of published poets and novelists, giving great credibility to their new specialization in Creative Writing. Now they can add a children’s author to this complement of expertise with the publication of Professor Jennifer Harris’ picture book, She Stitched The Stars: A Story Of Ellen Harding Baker's Solar System Quilt (Albert Whitman & Company), available in bookshops this October.

As more people return to indoor settings for work and school, new research shows stricter policy restrictions on business operations and indoor mask-wearing reduced COVID-19 cases in Ontario during the first and second waves.

As more countries consider legalizing non-medical cannabis, new research shows that prominent health warnings and less attractive packaging can reduce its appeal among young people.

In a recent study, researchers from the University of Waterloo found that the amount of advertising and promotion provided on packages changes how people see the product—whether they find it appealing to use or believe it's harmful. 

A group of researchers have used a groundbreaking new technique to reveal previously unrecognized properties of technologically crucial silicon crystals and uncovered new information about an important subatomic particle and a long-theorized fifth force of nature.

Two researchers are advancing their postdoctoral work at Waterloo Engineering backed by a fellowship launched last year.

New research will help mining companies better understand the negative societal and environmental impacts of mine-waste disasters, known as tailings flows, and hopefully avoid them.

Researchers created a database as part of a study that presents the first global picture of the occurrence rates, behaviours and physical impacts of tailings flows, which are rapid downstream movements of mine waste following failures of tailings impoundments.

Researchers have created a new system that increases the correctness and reliability of health-related searches by 80 per cent to help people make better decisions about topics like COVID-19.

Search engines are the most common tools the public uses to look for facts about COVID-19 and its effect on their health. A proliferation of misinformation can have real consequences, so a team at the University of Waterloo has created a way to make these searches more reliable. 

What transpires in comedies and cartoons when a character has a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other is not far off from people’s perceptions of the real world, finds a new study from the University of Waterloo.

Intended to illustrate the characters’ decision-making dilemma with comedic results, the moral character and motives of the supernatural beings are obvious. And people have similar expectations when it comes to individuals they see as good or bad.