Lauren is an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She was selected to be a 2005 Summer Research Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where she assisted the MIT Comparative Media Studies Department. Her previous work experience includes an internship at The Bohle Company, a California public relations and marketing firm for such technology companies as Alienware and the CMP Game Group.

She has written for UW's daily newspaper, The Daily Cardinal. Lauren was honored to accept an invitation in 2005 to lead a seminar on her research at Glasgow Caledonian University 's School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences.

For the past two years, Lauren has been an Undergraduate Research Scholar. She has completed a project titled, "Athletes' Use of Video Games to Mediate Their Play: College Students' Use of Sport Video Games." Her research interests include understanding the way in which playing sports and the related video game mutually reinforce one another, and whether sport video games provide a space for "mental imagery" practice.

Through extensive research on Tony Hawk Underground 2 (THUG2), Lauren sees a medium that involves players in a variety of design type activities. She is investigating the potential for schools to adopt this same approach in the classroom, using the already rich learning environment of such games.

She is also interested in how individuals with learning disabilities approach and can benefit from video games, machinima, and the design of games in relation to women.

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