The fast-paced developments in and the societal impact of AI reveal a greater need for researchers and professionals with more expertise and specific tools to tackle issues related to gender, diversity and intersectionality. This concerns, for example, awareness of cultural-organisational changes necessary to make AI a more diverse and inclusive science and industry.
It also concerns critical reflection on how AI concepts and techniques shape our scientific and everyday views of ourselves and others, and how these views can become distorted by biases in the algorithms that we use for analyses and applications. It has become evident that AI technologies are prone to having discriminatory and exclusionary effects unless researchers and professionals actively work to counteract these problems. For instance, an AI technology that is beneficial for one group of people (usually a majority group) may be harmful to another group of people; and this harm is more likely to fall on minorities because they are underrepresented in the training data and not involved in critical design phases and choices. It is vital that AI students, researchers, and professionals develop critical epistemologies and learn about these issues and develop ways to promote more equitable and inclusive uses and design of AI. To do justice to the complexity of these issues, it is important to approach the different categories of difference such as gender, race / ethnicity, sexuality, class, religion, age and ability/disability in an interdisciplinary manner and from an intersectional perspective.
We seek a candidate who can strengthen the links between AI, psychology and gender and diversity, and is able to achieve a high standard in teaching and research in this area. You will be expected to teach a course on ‘Bias in AI’ in the Master’s degree programme in Artificial Intelligence and an introduction course on ‘Gender, Diversity and Intersectionality in Psychology’ in the Bachelor’s degree programme in Psychology.
You will also be involved in the educational programme of the Gender and Diversity Studies group, who offer several minors and are developing an interfaculty Master’s degree programme on Gender and Intersectionality. Furthermore, you will initiate, conduct and supervise interdisciplinary research at the interface of gender, diversity and intersectionality and AI or cognitive science. You will be expected to regularly apply for, and obtain, external grant-based funding.
