Announcement: A convening for researchers and practitioners hosted by PDN & Roblox

PDN is excited to announce we will be co-hosting a convening - "Fostering Connection in Social Gaming" - with Roblox in Fall 2025 to explore, imagine and fund research for prosocial design that builds connection and community. 

Prosocial Design Network (PDN) is committed to promoting evidence-based designs that foster healthy interactions in online spaces. In large part that means connecting researchers with practitioners to build greater understanding of technologists' needs and constraints, giving researchers insights how their prosocial design research can be actionable.

Roblox is a gaming platform that hosts millions of experiences where people can "create, play and connect."  Roblox seeks to build the safest and most civil online platform, where everyone is empowered to create, learn, share, and thrive. Achieving this goal requires innovations that foster and strengthen positive interactions that build connection.

On October 17, PDN and Roblox will bring together researchers who have experience and insight into designing for connection and community with Roblox team members and developers for a full day workshop which checks so many boxes that jointly fulfill PDN's mission and Roblox's goals. The convening will:

• Create an opportunity to immediately translate research to practice, by putting practitioners interested in prosocial design into direct conversation with researchers who have insights into effective design, and even catalyzing design solutions on the spot.
• Give researchers deeper insights into the challenges and needs of platforms, as well as the feasibility and practical implementation of prosocial design innovations, to strengthen their ability to produce actionable research.
• Fund research to contribute to our shared knowledge of effective prosocial design, with $40,000 in research funding available to test ideas generated from the convening.
• Result - we hope - in ongoing connections and collaborations between researchers and prosocial-minded technologists.

If you are a researcher who may be interested in participating in the convening and want to learn more, please fill out this brief form. We will be sharing details and a full interest form in the upcoming weeks and will reach out to you then.

We need to say it again: PDN is really excited about this convening. It not only immediately hits three of our mission-driven goals - translating research into practice, fostering practice-informed research, and building connections between researchers and practitioners - we also see this convening as a model for future efforts to bridge research and practice. 

Have any questions about the event? Please reach out to PDN's Managing Director, Julia Kamin julia@prosocialdesign.org.

About the Prosocial Design Network

The Prosocial Design Network researches and promotes prosocial design: evidence-based design practices that bring out the best in human nature online. Learn more at prosocialdesign.org.