Pat Healy is a teaching assistant professor in the department of Informatics & Networked Systems as well as in English. Their coursework and research primarily focuses on the design, implementation, and evaluation of video games and other interactive media.
Recently their work has orbited around engaging with digital archives of history and art materials within virtual worlds, particularly in the Playable Archive project, which Pat created as part of their dissertation. They continue to pursue collaborations and mentorship with colleagues, community members, and students who share their interests in technology that engages the public in conversations around archived materials, such as in their Virtual Museum of Charles “Teenie” Harris.
Beyond this, Pat is dedicated to helping students develop as artists and designers. You can find them hosting the Games 4 Social Impact game jam each fall and advising as many independent studies as they can fit in any given semester, to directly mentor students in the craft of game design in their own personal projects.
Education & Training
- Ph.D., Information Science, University of Pittsburgh
- B.A., B.S., & B.S., Philosophy, Information Science, & Computer Science, University of Pittsburgh
- Best Paper at 2025 IEEE International Conference on Serious Games and Applications for Health
- Catherine Ofiesh and Gerald Orner Award, 2024
- Mary Ellen Callahan Undergraduate Research Award, 2018
Pat Healy. “Playable Archives: Virtual Worlds Expanding Access, Participation, and Conversation in the Archive”. PhD thesis. University of Pittsburgh, 2026.
Pat Healy and Hannah Standiford. “Enter the Paraverse: Challenging assumptions of live music in the Metaverse”. In: Proc. Eur. Conf. Games-based Learn. 17.1 (Sept. 2023), pp. 251–259.
Pat Healy et al. “An exposure-based video game (Dr. Zoo) to reduce needle phobia in children aged 3 to 6 years: Development and mixed methods pilot study”. en. In: JMIR Serious Games 11 (Oct. 2023), e42025.
Pat Healy et al. “Comparing the Use of Controllers and Hand Tracking in a Virtual Reality Nerve Block Simulation”. In: 2024 IEEE 12th International Conference on Serious Games and Applications for Health (SeGAH). 2024, pp. 1–8. doi: 10.1109/SeGAH61285.2024.10639607.
Pat Healy et al. “Which Part Makes It Work? Mechanism Exploration Through Feature Comparison in a Healthcare-Related Serious Game”. In: 2025 IEEE Conference on Serious Games and Applications for Health (SeGAH). 2025, pp. 1–8. doi: 10.1109/SeGAH65397.2025.11168291.
Virtual worlds, extended reality, serious games, digital cultural heritage, participatory design, game design, free and open source software, human-centered computing
