Varun Mishra
(he/him)
Assistant Professor, Interdisciplinary with the Bouvé College of Health Sciences

Research interests
- Ubiquitous computing for mental and behavioral health
- mHealth sensing and intervention
- Digital phenotyping
- Personal health informatics
Education
- PhD in Computer Science, Dartmouth College
- BTech in Computer Science and Engineering, Shiv Nadar University — India
Biography
Varun Mishra is an assistant professor in the Khoury College of Computer Sciences and the Bouvé College of Health Sciences at Northeastern University, based in Boston.
Mishra leverages ubiquitous technologies like smartphones and wearables to enable effective digital interventions for mental and behavioral health. His research in the broad field of ubiquitous computing lies at the intersection of mobile and wearable sensing, human-centered computing, data science, and behavioral science. His work is highly interdisciplinary, and he regularly collaborates with clinicians, psychologists, engineers, and other computer scientists to design, build, and deploy tools and systems.
Before joining Northeastern, Mishra worked as a postdoctoral researcher in the Center for Technology and Behavioral Health in the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College.
Labs and groups
Recent publications
-
Extending Stress Detection Reproducibility to Consumer Wearable Sensors
Citation: Ohida Binte Amin, Varun Mishra , Tinashe M. Tapera, Robert Volpe, Aarti Sathyanarayana. (2025). Extending Stress Detection Reproducibility to Consumer Wearable Sensors CoRR, abs/2505.05694. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2505.05694 -
CardioAI: A Multimodal AI-based System to Support Symptom Monitoring and Risk Prediction of Cancer Treatment-Induced Cardiotoxicity
Citation: Siyi Wu, Weidan Cao, Shihan Fu, Bingsheng Yao, Ziqi Yang, Changchang Yin, Varun Mishra , Daniel Addison, Ping Zhang , Dakuo Wang. (2025). CardioAI: A Multimodal AI-based System to Support Symptom Monitoring and Risk Prediction of Cancer Treatment-Induced Cardiotoxicity CHI, 313:1-313:22. https://doi.org/10.1145/3706598.3714272 -
Feasibility and Utility of Multimodal Micro Ecological Momentary Assessment on a Smartwatch
Citation: Ha Le, Veronika Potter, Rithika Lakshminarayanan, Varun Mishra , Stephen S. Intille. (2025). Feasibility and Utility of Multimodal Micro Ecological Momentary Assessment on a Smartwatch CHI, 1182:1-1182:22. https://doi.org/10.1145/3706598.3714086 -
AI on My Shoulder: Supporting Emotional Labor in Front-Office Roles with an LLM-based Empathetic Coworker
Citation: Vedant Das Swain, Qiuyue "Joy" Zhong, Jash Rajesh Parekh, Yechan Jeon, Roy Zimmermann, Mary P. Czerwinski, Jina Suh, Varun Mishra , Koustuv Saha, Javier Hernandez. (2025). AI on My Shoulder: Supporting Emotional Labor in Front-Office Roles with an LLM-based Empathetic Coworker CHI, 718:1-718:29. https://doi.org/10.1145/3706598.3713705 -
Vital Insight: Assisting Experts’ Sensemaking Process of Multi-modal Personal Tracking Data Using Visualization and LLM
Citation: Jiachen Li, Justin Steinberg, Xiwen Li, Akshat Choube, Bingsheng Yao, Dakuo Wang, Elizabeth D. Mynatt, Varun Mishra . (2024). Vital Insight: Assisting Experts' Sensemaking Process of Multi-modal Personal Tracking Data Using Visualization and LLM CoRR, abs/2410.14879. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2410.14879 -
Collecting Self-reported Physical Activity and Posture Data Using Audio-based Ecological Momentary Assessment
Citation: Ha Le, Rithika Lakshminarayanan, Jixin Li, Varun Mishra , Stephen S. Intille. (2024). Collecting Self-reported Physical Activity and Posture Data Using Audio-based Ecological Momentary Assessment Proc. ACM Interact. Mob. Wearable Ubiquitous Technol., 8, 111:1-111:35. https://doi.org/10.1145/3678584 -
Navigating the Paradox: Challenges and Strategies of University Students Managing Mental Health Medication in Real-World Practices
Citation: Jiachen Li, Justin Steinberg, Elizabeth D. Mynatt, Varun Mishra . (2024). Navigating the Paradox: Challenges and Strategies of University Students Managing Mental Health Medication in Real-World Practices CoRR, abs/2408.07784. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2408.07784 -
Clinical Challenges and AI Opportunities in Decision-Making for Cancer Treatment-Induced Cardiotoxicity
Citation: Siyi Wu, Weidan Cao, Shihan Fu, Bingsheng Yao, Ziqi Yang, Changchang Yin, Varun Mishra , Daniel Addison, Ping Zhang , Dakuo Wang. (2024). Clinical Challenges and AI Opportunities in Decision-Making for Cancer Treatment-Induced Cardiotoxicity CoRR, abs/2408.03586. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2408.03586 -
Building an Open-Source Community to Enhance Autonomic Nervous System Signal Analysis: DBDP-Autonomic
Citation: Jessilyn Dunn, Varun Mishra , Md. Mobashir Hasan Shandhi, Hayoung Jeong, Natasha Yamane, Yuna Watanabe, Bill Chen, Matthew S. Goodwin. (2024). Building an Open-Source Community to Enhance Autonomic Nervous System Signal Analysis: DBDP-Autonomic CoRR, abs/2403.17165. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2403.17165 -
SOSW: Stress Sensing With Off-the-Shelf Smartwatches in the Wild
Citation: Kobiljon Toshnazarov, Uichin Lee, Byung Hyung Kim, Varun Mishra , Lismer Andres Caceres Najarro, Youngtae Noh. (2024). SOSW: Stress Sensing With Off-the-Shelf Smartwatches in the Wild IEEE Internet Things J., 11, 21527-21545. https://doi.org/10.1109/JIOT.2024.3375299 -
Investigating Social Interaction Patterns with Depression Severity across Different Personality Traits Using Digital Phenotyping
Citation: Ohida Binte Amin, Varun Mishra , Aarti Sathyanarayana. (2023). Investigating Social Interaction Patterns with Depression Severity across Different Personality Traits Using Digital Phenotyping ACIIW, 1-4. https://doi.org/10.1109/ACIIW59127.2023.10388164 -
“Always Nice and Confident, Sometimes wrong”: Developer’s Experiences Engaging Generative AI Chatbots Versus Human-Powered Q&A Platforms
Citation: Jiachen Li, Elizabeth D. Mynatt, Varun Mishra , Jonathan Bell. (2023). "Always Nice and Confident, Sometimes wrong": Developer's Experiences Engaging Generative AI Chatbots Versus Human-Powered Q&A Platforms CoRR, abs/2309.13684. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2309.13684 -
Detecting Receptivity for mHealth Interventions
Citation: Varun Mishra , Florian Künzler, Jan-Niklas Kramer, Elgar Fleisch, Tobias Kowatsch, David Kotz. (2023). Detecting Receptivity for mHealth Interventions GetMobile Mob. Comput. Commun., 27, 23-28. https://doi.org/10.1145/3614214.3614221 -
FLIRT: A Feature Generation Toolkit for Wearable Data
Citation: Föll, Simon, Martin Maritsch, Federica Spinola, Varun Mishra, Filipe Barata, Tobias Kowatsch, Elgar Fleisch, and Felix Wortmann. "FLIRT: A Feature Generation Toolkit for Wearable Data." Computer Methods and Programs in Biomedicine (2021): 106461. -
6th International Workshop on Mental Health and Well-being: Sensing and Intervention
Citation: Varun Mishra , Akane Sano, Sahiti Kunchay, Saeed Abdullah, Jakob E. Bardram, Elizabeth L. Murnane, Tanzeem Choudhury, Mirco Musolesi, Giovanna Nunes Vilaza, Rajalakshmi Nandakumar, Tauhidur Rahman. (2021). 6th International Workshop on Mental Health and Well-being: Sensing and Intervention UbiComp/ISWC Adjunct, 185-187. https://doi.org/10.1145/3460418.3479264 -
Detecting Receptivity for mHealth Interventions in the Natural Environment
Citation: Varun Mishra, Florian Künzler, Jan-Niklas Kramer, Elgar Fleisch, Tobias Kowatsch, and David Kotz. 2021. Detecting Receptivity for mHealth Interventions in the Natural Environment. Proc. ACM Interact. Mob. Wearable Ubiquitous Technol. 5, 2, Article 74 (June 2021), 24 pages. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3463492