First-year information science PhD student Tzu-Yu (Chloe) Weng and Information Science Assistant Professor Karthik S. Bhat, PhD received an Honorable Mention Award for their paper “A Blessing and a Challenge: Unpacking Boundary Ambiguities Experienced by Caregivers of Older Adults”, which they presented during the ACM CHI 2026 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in Barcelona, Spain, earlier this month. Honorable Mention awards are given only to the top 5% of submissions.
In this interview, Weng discusses the roles this research, her doctoral mentor Bhat, and the conference played in deepening her understanding of the rigor of inquiry; expanding her critical thinking; and offering a view of a research career's impact and value.
SCIS: How did you develop your contributions to the research and what were your findings?
TW: The project actually started with me coming across the concept of boundary ambiguity in family systems theory. It describes a state in which people are uncertain about who is responsible for what within a family. The moment I read it, I brought it up with Dr. Bhat, and we wanted to see whether we could use this concept to better understand the experiences of informal caregivers of older adults.
To explore that, we conducted 15 interviews with informal caregivers of older adults across the U.S. What we found was that boundaries are not fixed or stable. They are inherently unstable, permeable, and elastic, requiring constant renegotiations. Caregivers cope in two main ways: internally, by drawing on faith, culture, or personal reframing to make their role feel meaningful; and externally, by redistributing responsibilities across family members and technology. But neither strategy fully resolves the underlying uncertainty about where caregiving boundaries should be set or reset.
On the design side, we used these insights to propose a rethinking of how technology supports caregivers, moving away from tools that assume clean, stable boundaries toward ones that help families navigate their evolving boundaries over time.
SCIS: Were you surprised or excited by anything in the research or the collaboration process with Dr. Bhat?
TW: Working with Dr. Bhat has honestly been one of the most rewarding parts of this whole experience. He is someone who will always patiently listen to all of my random research ideas, no matter how half-formed they are, and help me think through whether they are actually practical or not. That process taught me so much about what rigorous research really looks like, and I feel like I grew enormously as a researcher just over the course of writing this paper.
What I appreciate most is that he never just hands me an answer. He always pushes me to think it through myself, which can be challenging in the moment, but looking back I realize that is exactly what has shaped my critical thinking. And whenever I felt like giving up, he was always there with encouragement to keep going. He has this way of pulling you back on track without making you feel lost, and I am really grateful for that kind of mentorship.
SCIS: What was your reaction to hearing about the Honorable Mention award?
"It helped me realize what research can look like and that the work I am doing actually matters to people."
TW: My first reaction was to ask Karthik whether this was a dream. Getting accepted to CHI was already such a big surprise for me, so hearing about the Honorable Mention on top of that just felt completely surreal. I genuinely did not expect it.
But beyond the initial shock, it actually meant something deeper to me. It helped me realize what research can look like and that the work I am doing actually matters to people beyond just myself. That has been really meaningful, especially as someone who is still early in their research journey.
SCIS: What are your research areas and what would you like to pursue in the future, both short and long term?
TW: My current research focuses on informal caregivers of older adults, and I am particularly interested in understanding the relationships between different stakeholders in care work, including how technology plays a role in shaping those relationships and the caregiving experience itself. Being a caregiver myself, I have personally noticed how many of their challenges go unnoticed, and that drives a lot of why I care about this work.
More broadly, as technology advances so quickly, the way people interact with each other is also changing. We are already seeing many tools being brought into care work to support things like communication and collaboration among caregivers. But that raises important questions that I want to keep exploring, like how do we actually evaluate whether these tools are safe, and whether they are addressing the real needs of informal caregivers rather than just adding another layer of complexity to their lives.
SCIS: What led you to Drexel’s PhD in information science?
TW: I had known Drexel for its research reputation as an R1 institution, but honestly, coming to Drexel was largely because of Karthik. I had the chance to chat with him before I even submitted my application, and from that conversation I could tell that not only did we share similar research orientations, but that he would also be a truly good mentor. And he truly is.