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Education
Ph.D. in Computer Science
May 2024
Washington University in St. Louis
B.A. in Computer Science
May 2019
Smith College
B.A. in Architecture & Urbanism
May 2019
Smith College
Experience
Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Aug 2024-present
Army Research Laboratory, Washington DC
Researched human-AI teaming for visual search tasks. My work investigates the impact of individual differences on performance and reliance on AI-augmented CAD in visual search tasks.
AI Research Intern
Summer 2023
IBM Research, Yorktown Heights NY
Led the design of a human-in-the-loop framework and interactive UI prototype for the AI-based system CARGO, enabling real-time refinement of microservice boundaries through user-driven labeling and data visualizations (HTML/CSS/JS/D3.js). Conducted case-study evaluations with software engineers, demonstrating the system’s usability and effectiveness.
Document Intelligence Research Intern
Summer 2022
Adobe Research, San Jose CA
Conducted formative interviews with knowledge workers to uncover key factors and heuristics used in contract reviews. Built a prototype for an AI-assisted contract reviewing tool (HTML/CSS/JS/Dash.js) that facilitates exploration of the document space and in-situ reviewing while improving revenue forecasting confidence and reducing reviewers' cognitive load.
Social Dynamics Research Intern
Summer 2018
Nokia Bell Labs, Cambridge UK
Conducted large-scale data mining and geospatial analysis to examine historical, cultural, and societal patterns in street naming across major global cities. Built a data pipeline to extract, clean, and enrich street name datasets, revealing geographic and temporal disparities in representation and how toponymy reflects local values and identity.
Awards
IEEE VIS Inclusivity and Diversity Scholarship
2022
NSF Smart Health & AI Student Awardee
2020
Grace Hopper Scholar
2018
Service
EuroVis Short Paper Committee
2025
IEEE VIS Student Program Committee (VisComm)
2021 - 2022
IEEE VIS Reviewer
2022 - 2025
CRPI Reviewer
2024 - 2025
Conference Organizing
Student Committee Member, IEEE Visualization for Communication (VisComm), 2022
Student Committee Member, IEEE Visualization for Communication (VisComm), 2021
Conference Reviewing
IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics (TVCG), 2023
ACM SIGCHI Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing (CSCW), 2023
ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2023
IEEE Visualization for Communication (VisComm), 2022
IEEE Visualization Conference, 2022
IEEE Visualization for Communication (VisComm), 2020
European Creative Industry Summit (ECIS), 2020
Guest Lectures
Visualization Design Studio @ Columbia School of Nursing, 2022
Visualization for Decision-Making @ WPI, 2021
Mentorship & University Service
Student Mentor for the WashU First Gen Program, 2021 - 2023
Graduate Student Senator, 2020 - 2023
WashU representative and mentor at the Tapia Conference, 2022
DataKind Reviewer for the data.org Inclusive Growth and Recovery Challenge, 2020
Publications
Conference Proceedings
The Anatomy of a Plea: How Uncertainty, Visualizations & Individual Differences Shape Plea Bargain Decisions
Melanie Bancilhon, Alvitta Ottley, Andrew Jordan
ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2025
PDF
Video
Song
Trust Calibration for Joint Human/AI Decision-making in Dynamic and Uncertain Contexts
Laura R. Marusich, Benjamin T. Files, Melanie Bancilhon, Justine C. Rawal, Adrienne Raglin
27th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, 2025
PDF
Why Combining Text and Visualization Could Improve Bayesian Reasoning: A Cognitive Load Perspective
Melanie Bancilhon, AJ Wright, Sunwoo Ha, Jordan Crouser, Alvitta Ottley
ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2023
HTML
PDF
VizXP: A Visualization Framework for Conveying Explanations to Users in Model Reconciliation Problems
Ashwin Kumar, Stylianos Loukas Vasileiou, Melanie Bancilhon, William Yeoh, Alvitta Ottley
ICAPS Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling, 2021
HTML
PDF
Let’s Gamble: How a Poor Visualization Can Elicit Risk Behavior
Melanie Bancilhon, Zhengliang Liu, Alvitta Ottley
IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, 2020
HTML
PDF
Video
Journal Articles
Streetonomics: Quantifying culture using street names
Melanie Bancilhon, Marios Constantinides, EP Bogucka, Luca Maria Aiello, Daniele Quercia
PLoS ONE 16(6): e0252869, 2021
HTML
PDF
Cartographic Design of Cultural Maps
Edyta Paulina Bogucka, Marios Constantinides, Luca Maria Aiello, Daniele Quercia, Wonyoung So, Melanie Bancilhon
IEEE Transactions on Computer Graphics and Applications, 2020
HTML
PDF
Workshop Papers
Book Chapters
Toward an Optimized Human-AI Reviewing Strategy for Contract Inspection.
Melanie Bancilhon, Alexa Siu, Ryan Rossi, Nedim Lipka
The New Era of Business Intelligence, IntechOpen, 2024
HTML
PDF
Improving Evaluation Using Visualization Decision-Making Models: A Practical Guide
Melanie Bancilhon, Lace Padilla, Alvitta Ottley
Visualization Psychology, Springer, 2023
HTML
PDF
Poster Presentations
Icons are Best: Ranking Visualizations for Proportion Estimation
Zhengliang Liu, Melanie Bancilhon, Alvitta Ottley
IEEE Information Visualization, 2019
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