Graduate School of Learning, Interaction and Knowledge in a Digitalized World (LIKED)

The LIKED Graduate School is based on the assumption that the digitalization of society results in challenges and opportunities for learning and education that require changes - from current to future practices. LIKED is a national collaboration between nine universities.

Today's ongoing processes of digitalization create situations where not only learners but citizens at large need new competences to cope with everyday life, competences that differ from those in pre-digital times. The internet is increasingly embedded in what can be described as a digital world, and research on learning, interaction, and knowledge in an internet-mediated world is increasingly required.

In a lifelong perspective, one effect of digitization is that we need to understand which tasks can and should be taken over or facilitated by technological artifacts and which should be performed by humans. This has implications for what should be taught in school, what tools students should be introduced to and supported to master.

Research areas within LIKED

The graduate school will address the following broadly formulated areas:

• How does the digitalization of society change the conditions for teaching and learning in general, and as activities that aim to provide competences for managing everyday life in a digitalized society?
• How can these competences be described, analyzed and understood in terms of learning, interaction and knowledge in a digitalized world?
• How can modern digital forms of interaction and automated learning systems, based on artificial intelligence and machine learning, be understood in terms of new learning opportunities to support students and teachers?
• What is the impact of social media on everyday life in schools as a whole, for individual children and young people in general?
• What does a changing practice and culture mean for the conditions for learning, interaction and knowledge in society and in schools?

A multidisciplinary approach

One of the fundamental starting points for the Graduate School of Learning, Interaction and Knowledge in a Digitalized World (LIKED) is an interdisciplinary approach. Subject didactics, didactics, pedagogy, technology and learning, media technology, informatics, pedagogical work and applied IT are subject areas represented in the graduate school. These contribute with different perspectives for research in learning, interaction, and knowledge in a digital world.

LIKED builds on previously well-established research collaborations. Together, the researchers in the LIKED group have been conducting research projects, formal and informal collaborations and joint activities for more than a decade. Together, they already run two national graduate schools on the impact of digitalization.