Kayhan Latifzadeh

Hello, world!

I'm Kayhan [kʲejhɒːn] 🔈. I studied Computer Engineering at the University of Guilan, Rasht, Iran. I then pursued a Master's degree in Artificial Intelligence and Robotics at SRTTU, Tehran, Iran. Currently, I am a PhD Candidate in Computer Science at the Computational Interaction (COIN) group (under the supervision of Prof. Luis A. Leiva) at the University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg.

My research focuses on decoding physiological signals to enhance human-computer interaction (HCI), with an emphasis on electroencephalogram (EEG) signals, eye tracking, and analysis of head and hand movements. I explore how these signals can be leveraged to understand user states and to inform the design of more adaptive and responsive interactive systems. My work spans key HCI contexts including visual attention modeling, skill assessment, affective computing, and cognitive load assessment. I use machine learning techniques to model and interpret these physiological signals.

Throughout my PhD studies, I had the opportunity to collaborate as a visiting researcher with the Humans Interacting with Computers (HICUP) lab (under the supervision of Prof. Klen Čopič Pucihar and Prof. Matjaž Kljun) at the University of Primorska, Slovenia, the Information eXperience (IX) Lab (under the supervision of Prof. Jacek Gwizdka) at the University of Texas at Austin, USA, and the Advanced Mixed Reality Interfaces Lab (under the supervision of Prof. Alexander Plopski) at the Graz University of Technology, Austria.

Maison du Nombre 6, avenue de la Fonte L-4364 Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg

Publication

Kayhan Latifzadeh, Jacek Gwizdka, Luis A Leiva. (2025). A Versatile Dataset of Mouse and Eye Movements on Search Engine Results Pages. In Proceedings of the 48th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval. 3412--3421. [DOI][Codes][Dataset]

Mairo Villaizán-Vallelado, Matteo Salvatori, Kayhan Latifzadeh, Antonio Penta, Luis A Leiva, Ioannis Arapakis. (2025). AdSight: Scalable and Accurate Quantification of User Attention in Multi-Slot Sponsored Search. In Proceedings of the 48th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval. 255--265. [DOI][Dataset]

Kayhan Latifzadeh, Luis A Leiva. (2025). Assessing Medical Training Skills via Eye and Head Movements. In Proceedings of the 33rd ACM Conference on User Modeling, Adaptation and Personalization. 1--10. [DOI][Codes][Dataset]

Kayhan Latifzadeh, Luis A Leiva. (2025). Thalamus: A User Simulation Toolkit for Prototyping Multimodal Sensing Studies. In Adjunct Proceedings of the 33rd ACM Conference on User Modeling, Adaptation and Personalization. 109--113. [DOI][Codes]

Syrine Haddad, Kayhan Latifzadeh, Saravanakumar Duraisamy, Jean Vanderdonckt, Olfa Daassi, Safya Belghith, Luis A. Leiva. (2024). Good GUIs, Bad GUIs: Affective Evaluation of Graphical User Interfaces. In Proceedings of the 32nd ACM Conference on User Modeling, Adaptation and Personalization (UMAP). [DOI]

Kayhan Latifzadeh, Nima Gozalpour, V Javier Traver, Tuukka Ruotsalo, Aleksandra Kawala-Sterniuk, Luis A. Leiva. (2024). Efficient Decoding of Affective States from Video-elicited EEG Signals: An Empirical Investigation. ACM Transactions on Multimedia Computing, Communications and Applications. ACM New York, NY. [DOI]

Kayhan Latifzadeh, Luis A. Leiva. (2022). Gustav: Cross-device Cross-computer Synchronization of Sensory Signals. In Adjunct Proceedings of the 35th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology. 1--3. [DOI]

Reza Sarailoo, Kayhan Latifzadeh, S Hamid Amiri, Alireza Bosaghzadeh, Reza Ebrahimpour. (2022). Assessment of instantaneous cognitive load imposed by educational multimedia using electroencephalography signals. Frontiers in Neuroscience. 16, 744737. Frontiers. [DOI]

Academic Service

Student Volunteers Co-Chair, 2024 ACM conference on Conversational User Interfaces (CUI '24), Luxembourg City, Luxembourg, 8 to 10 July 2024
Student Volunteer, The 8th Summer School on Computational Interaction (CIX'24), Belval, Luxembourg, 3 to 7 June 2024
Student Volunteer, 2023 ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '23), Hamburg, Germany, 23 to 28 April 2023

Talks

PhD Talk: Decoding EEG and Eye-movement Signals in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)
Institute of Computer Graphics and Vision, Graz University of Technology
Graz, Austria, April 25, 2025

Teaching

Web Development 1 - Teaching Assistant

Teaching practical sessions (JavaScript basics), grading exams

Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) - Guest Lecturer

Delivered a presentation on the affective evaluation of graphical user interfaces.

Alumni

Hugo Barthelemy, BSc student and research assistant, University of Luxembourg, 2023-2025
1. Bachelor Semester Project; Gesture Symphony: Playing music using hand gestures [GitHub Repo]
2. Bachelor Semester Project; AdSight: Social Media Marketing and Advertising Optimization through Eye Tracking [GitHub Repo]
3. Bachelor Semester Project; Exploring Jupiter’s Galilean Moons: A Comparative Study of VR Learning vs. Traditional Methods
4. Bachelor Semester Project; Eye Socket: A Browser Extension for Real-Time Eye-Tracking Device Integration UsingWebSocket Technology

David Pereira de Magalhaes, BSc student, University of Luxembourg, 2025
1. Bachelor Semester Project; TEMO: Emotion Recognition Based Drone Interaction [GitHub Repo]
2. Bachelor Semester Project; Controlling Drone via Hand Movements in Mixed Reality Games [GitHub Repo]

Saad Shakeel, BSc student, University of Luxembourg, 2024
1. Bachelor Semester Project; Designing a Website to Measure User Emotions During Multimedia Interaction: Valence and Arousal Reporting

Giorgos Kotsias, BSc student, University of Luxembourg, 2024
1. Bachelor Semester Project; Design and Implementation of a Website to Measure User Cognitive Load During Memory Games of Varying Difficulty

Joao Bernardo Sousa Faria, BSc student, University of Luxembourg, 2024
1. Bachelor Semester Project; GIFective: A Website for Grading GIFs in Conveying Emotional Moods

Karyna Ouahrani, BSc student, University of Luxembourg, 2023
1. Bachelor Semester Project; BeatsLab: Development of a Web Application for Drumming and Exploring Usability Methods on it

Personal

I enjoy reading books, particularly novels, as well as general books on psychology and cognitive neuroscience. Feel free to check out my my Goodreads page, although I don’t update it regularly. I also enjoy playing video games and walking, which I do quite often. When I have time on the weekends, I love cooking, mainly Persian cuisine.