Curriculum | Master's structure | Interaction Technology

The Master’s in Interaction Technology consists of two years, in which you will collect a total of 120 EC. What your curriculum looks like is completely up to you! Apart from one mandatory course, you have a great deal of freedom in composing your own Master’s, with many electives you can choose from, as long as you comply with the requirements of the programme.

European Credit Transfer System

Student workload at Dutch universities is expressed in EC, also named ECTS (European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System), widely used throughout the European Union. In the Netherlands, each credit represents 28 hours of work. The recognition of credits is at the discretion of your Master's.

Structure

You will build your curriculum around six pillars. Within each pillar, there’s a large variety of courses you can choose from. You need to select a minimum amount of courses within each of these pillars, to help you gain knowledge and skills across the full breadth of the field of interaction technology. Additionally, you will benefit from extra elective space – 25 EC – which you can fill up with any course of any pillar, or even more advanced courses on a specific subject. The course Foundations of Interaction Technology is mandatory for all students.

Together with the programme mentor, you will discuss how to compose a set of courses meeting your specific interests, while also complying with the coherence of the programme as a whole.

Technology (min. 20 EC)
Understanding Humans & Context (min. 10 EC)
Research (min. 10 EC)
Storytelling (min. 5 EC)
Design (min. 5 EC)
Impact, Innovation & Entrepreneurship (min. 5 EC)
Additional electives (25 EC)
You can choose any of the electives of the six pillars, or more advanced courses on certain topics, such as Advanced Affective Computing, Advanced Natural Language Processing or Advanced Brain Computer Interfaces. Choosing a Capita Selecta is also an option. This is a self-study course in which you explore a specific topic of your interest, which is not offered as a regular course. In that case, you need to find a supervisor who can support you. Another option is to fill up part of your elective space with an internship. Or what about taking some courses at a university abroad?
Graduation project (40 EC)
You will end your Master’s in iTech by writing your master’s thesis (30 EC). You can conduct your final project within the industry, but you can conduct research at the university as well. You could also complete your thesis abroad. The course Research Topics (10 EC) serves as a preparation for your thesis.

“I chose to follow the Master’s in Interaction Technology at UT because I want to become an expert in human-centred design. I am mostly interested in the early phases of interaction technology design, like ideation and conceptualisation. I enjoy talking to (possible) users, gaining an understanding of their problems, needs and/or wishes and translating their input into a solution that will actually help them. In that sense, I would like to become the linking pin between users and designers/developers, as a consultant, for example.”

“During my Bachelor’s in Creative Technology, I enjoyed exploring technology and innovation from both a technical and design perspective. I wanted to continue this in my Master’s, while also exploring and developing my innovative and entrepreneurial skills. I chose the EIT Double Degree in Human Computer Interaction and Design (HCID) because it has a strong focus on entrepreneurship and it offers many opportunities for network-building and exploring interesting companies. And of course, I really liked the option of going abroad – to Stockholm in my case – for one year.”

“I did a Bachelor’s in Computer Science in Italy, but I realised I was not really interested in programming and software development. The field of Human-Computer Interaction spoke more to me, so I initially chose the EIT Double Degree in Human Computer Interaction and Design (HCID). But I liked the University of Twente so much that I decided to switch and do the full Master’s in Interaction Technology here, also because I believe UT offers far more interesting possibilities for internships and your thesis as well. I decided to focus on gaining a more academic approach to user experience design, since I might want to continue with a PhD.”

Master's thesis

The last semester is dedicated to your master’s thesis. The choice of your graduation subject is largely up to you. You could focus on the development of a certain type of interactive technology within a specific context, like a social robot, serious game, or conversational agent. Or you can perform an experiment to evaluate how people interact with a certain type of technology. You can even explore futuristic interaction methods. For example: is it possible to control a game with your mind? Wherever your interests lie, there’s a wide variety of interesting and societally relevant topics you can choose from. You can also choose to complete your final project at an external company or a partner university abroad!

In your master’s thesis, you could focus on subjects such as:

What effect does a learning environment in Immersive Virtual Reality have on the ability to learn new vocabulary?
How can a mediated social touch technology enhance social connectedness for remote loved ones?
How can we develop an interactive sport-training game, based on an interactive floor, to train volleyball exercises?