Tong Zhao's thesis, Why Parents Reach for Their Phones: Families and the Attention Economy, examines phone addiction not as a personal failing but as a symptom of broader emotional, behavioral, and social pressures shaping contemporary family life. Phone addiction is often framed as a personal weakness, a failure of discipline, or even a moral issue. In conversations about parenting, this judgment becomes especially sharp. We see parents scrolling beside their children and immediately assume neglect. But behind many of these moments is not indifference, but exhaustion, anxiety, loneliness, and uncertainty. Tong's thesis begins from a shift in perspective: instead of blaming parents for their relationship with technology, what if systems were designed to support them emotionally, behaviorally, and socially?

Rida Zeng's thesis, Metaphor as Medicine: Revealing Meaning to Transform Chronic Pain, asks a question millions of people meet every time they walk into a doctor's office: how do you describe a pain that has no words? Today, 1 in 4 adults in the U.S. live with chronic pain, the leading cause of disability worldwide. Yet the clinical communication standard remains the Wong-Baker chart, invented in the 1980s.

Eva Mo’s thesis, Between Presence and Production: Boundary Collapse in Remote Work, examines how remote labor reshapes domestic space and everyday cognition, arguing that many of the stresses associated with working from home stem less from productivity itself than from the disappearance of clear environmental boundaries.

Qianyue Zhou’s thesis, Performing Realness: Posting, Pressure, and Visibility on Social Media, investigates how social media transforms everyday life into something visible, measurable, and performative. Beginning with her own experience of overthinking what to post, she explores how the desire to appear authentic online can create new forms of pressure. Her work looks closely at the full cycle of a moment capture, review, share, and response — and proposes alternative ways for people to document and exchange real life with less performance, less optimization, and more presence.

Guðrún Þöll Torfadóttir’s thesis Designing Everyday Energy: Reimagining Renewables in the Home explores how electricity can be generated within the home and how renewable energy can become more accessible in everyday life. Growing up in Iceland, where all electricity comes from renewable sources, Guðrún was surprised to discover that New York City, one of the world’s most powerful cities, still relies on fossil fuels to generate energy. Her thesis asks: how might renters in urban environments become active participants in the transition to clean energy while reducing their electricity costs?

Sige Zheng's thesis, Sharing Waves: When Digital Nomads Meet Local Communities in Puerto Escondido, Mexico, investigates how the rapid growth of digital nomadism affects community life and local infrastructure in Puerto Escondido. As a designer, surfer, and traveler, Sige has witnessed the surge in remote work and digital nomadism following COVID-19. Digital nomads arrive in Puerto Escondido and fall in love with the place. But love without responsibility has a cost—tourism growth has outpaced local infrastructure development. While grassroots organizations continue to support the community, many newcomers remain parallel to these efforts. This thesis asks: how might design create a meaningful bridge between those who are passing through and the communities and places they encounter—at the beginning, during, and beyond their journey?

Lynn Zhang’s thesis, From Compulsive to Conscious: Using Somatic Rituals to Rewrite Behaviors, explores how design can transform the physical intensity found in compulsive behaviors into safer, voluntary, and meaning-making rituals. For Lynn, the project began with a contradiction: why do people sometimes deliberately seek physical pain? Habits like nail biting, skin picking, or hair pulling may seem minor, but they exist on a spectrum that can escalate into compulsive, addictive, or self-injurious behavior.

Lauren Palazzi’s thesis, Holding On Differently: Reimagining Heirlooms in an Ephemeral World, examines how inheritance is changing and what that means for the objects and stories people leave behind. Rather than treating heirlooms as rare or especially valuable possessions, the project looks at the broader systems that shape how meaning is preserved, transferred, or lost across generations. It asks what happens when the cultural habits that once sustained heirlooms no longer fit the way people live now.