What is PIPE?
PIPE – Professional Interaction and Practice unites three different research groups at the University of Southern Denmark that are studying human interaction and professional practices: the SOPRACON group in Odense, the SOIL project in Kolding and the Human-Robot Interaction Lab at Sønderborg. PIPE spans across the Department of Language and Communication in Odense (ISK) and the Department of Design and Communication in Kolding and Sonderborg (IDK).
PIPE is funded as a strategic network by the Faculty of the Humanities for a 3-year period (2016-2019). Its mission is to strengthen the internal collaboration between the three campus areas of the university, to enhance the liaison to professional communities, institution and businesses outside the university, to intensify international contacts, and to improve research quality and quantity. PIPE researchers have a long tradition in studying professional expertise and interactional practices across a wide variety of settings and disciplines, professions and workplaces, as e.g. education; health care; social service; business; human robot interaction; mobility, transport and safety. Findings from this research have concerned professional skills and their development; the constitution of institutional and professional identities; learning and instruction as social practice; distinctions between institutional and non-institutional interaction; strategies for managing communicative impairments of various sorts; mobility and safety; technologies and change in the workplace; welfare and co-participation; and innovation through participation.
These studies of interactions in different environments have given significant results with strong relevance for practitioners. Among them are the following:
