D800: Human-Computer Interaction

Human-Computer Interaction is the HCI specialization's core course — genuinely interdisciplinary, drawing from psychology, design, and engineering to understand how people actually use technology.

What D800 covers

The course covers HCI principles, incorporating insights from psychology, design, and engineering to understand user interactions, preparing students to design and evaluate user-centered systems using tools like wireframing and eye tracking.

The course addresses ethical implications (privacy, consent, accessibility), develops basic data analysis skills for interpreting user testing results, and includes completing the CITI IRB Protocol Review for working with human subjects.

The D800 performance assessment

Expect a performance assessment requiring you to design and evaluate a user-centered interactive system, incorporating user testing data analysis and addressing ethical/IRB considerations.

Key topics in D800

• HCI principles from psychology, design, and engineering
• Wireframing and eye tracking
• Privacy, consent, and accessibility ethics
• CITI IRB Protocol Review for human subjects research

Writing tips for D800

Follow the task instructions and rubric line by line

WGU performance assessments for D800 are graded against a fixed rubric — every rubric line has to be visibly addressed, usually with a labeled heading that mirrors the rubric language. Skipping a rubric point because it seems minor is the single most common reason a competent submission comes back "Not Yet Competent" for revision.

Show your work: code, reasoning, and test results, not just a final answer

WGU evaluators are trained to distinguish genuine technical work from a paraphrased summary. Include your actual code, algorithmic reasoning, and test/benchmark results, not just a description of what you built — a rubric checking technical competency wants to see the artifact and the thinking behind it.

Because WGU is self-paced, don't let "no deadline pressure" become no submission

There's no weekly due date forcing progress, which means procrastination costs more at WGU than at a traditional term-based school — a stalled task can quietly eat weeks of a term. Treat your own target date for each D800 assessment as a real deadline.

Why students seek help with D800

Students sometimes skip the IRB/ethics component when working with human test subjects — since this course specifically requires the CITI IRB Protocol Review, that step shouldn't be treated as optional paperwork.

How GradeEssays helps with D800

Share your HCI project scenario and rubric, and your writer will build the design/evaluation work with the IRB and ethics considerations properly addressed.

Prerequisites and program context

D800 has no listed prerequisites and is specific to the M.S. Computer Science, Human-Computer Interaction specialization. Note: it shares the CCN "ICSC 6203" with D803 (Natural Language Processing, in the AI/ML specialization) — a numbering coincidence between the two specializations, not the same course.

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