In his research, he explores how online communities and other social media can be designed to enable meaningful reflection, promote competency awareness and building, and facilitate peer-to-peer support. He is also a research partner with the Institute for National Security Education and Research (INSER) at the University of Washington. With INSER he is studying collaboration and group behavior in alternate reality games – investigating the practices through which game players share support and knowledge with one another as they work to advance the plot of the game. Dr. Gurzick has a B.S. in computer science from Frostburg State University, an M.S. in Computer Science from Hood College, and a Ph.D. in Information Systems from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.