Social Science Research Institute awards AI seed grants

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - The Penn State Center for Social Data Analytics and the Consortium on Moral Decision-Making, in collaboration with the Social Science Research Institute (SSRI), has announced the recipients of its most recent seed grant awards. Six projects representing seven colleges and three universities received seed funding.

The awards will support innovative, interdisciplinary research projects that either apply artificial intelligence (AI) and data science to advance understanding of social and behavioral processes or examine the societal, ethical and human dimensions of AI.

The winning proposals came from a wide range of collaborations involving faculty from a variety of disciplines in human development and family studies, sociology and criminology, education policy studies, cybersecurity and psychology.

The awarded projects are:

"The State of Connection: A survey of technology, communication, relationships, and well-being"

This State of Connection project seeks to conduct the first wave of the State of Connection Survey with collaborators at Arizona State University and Duke University. Using biennial surveys, the researchers aim to understand what technology people are using to communicate with members of their social networks, how they are using them and the consequences for people's relationships, health and well-being.

• Andrew High, Penn State College of the Liberal Arts
• Liesel Sharabi, Arizona State University
• Ying Chen, Duke University

"Persuasion-Aware Explanations for Safer AI-Mediated Decisions"

This project will support the development and study of persuasion-aware explanations to support safer decisions in AI-mediated communication, especially for scams and misinformation. The study trains individuals to identify AI generated misinformation materials to lessen susceptibility to online scams.

• Yuchen Yang, Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology
• Yujin Heo, Penn State Bellisario College of Communications
• Dongwon Lee, Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology
• Taro Yang, Penn State College of the Liberal Arts

"Use and Validation of AI Chatbots in Collaborative Learning in Higher Education Learning Environments"

This project will support the cross-disciplinary development and pilot testing of AiPRACTISE, a pipeline for socially responsible design, implementation, deployment and iterative fine-tuning of a series of multi-agent, local large language mode environments that enable AI chatbot-facilitated collaborative learning activities. The learning activities are aimed at generating better, more efficient outcomes for students and faculty The researchers will pilot test its scalability when used in collaborative assignments in classes across six departments and three Penn State campuses.

• Sy-Miin Chow, Penn State College of Health and Human Development
• Youakim Badr, Penn State Great Valley, data analytics and artificial intelligence
• Marcela Borge, Penn State College of Education
• Orfeu M. Buxton, Penn State College of Health and Human Development
• Puiwa Lei, Penn State College of Education
• Matthew D. Beckman, Penn State Eberly College of Science
• Marjorie E. Bond, Statistics, Penn State Eberly College of Science
• John Hubrick, Penn State World Campus, instructional design

"AI-driven Infrastructure to Advance Interdisciplinary Research on Eviction"

The project will address building deep understanding and advancing the social science research potential of the Eviction Knowledge Graph, a recently designed AI-driven database that will integrate eviction-related policies, programs and research into a searchable structure to support rigorous, interdisciplinary analysis.

• Selena Ortiz, Penn State College of Health and Human Development
• Dongwon Lee, Penn State College of Health and Human Development

"The Role of Positive Psychology as a Lens for Leveraging AI to Foster Inclusive and Affirming Work Environments"

This project addresses the persistent gap between harm reduction and the proactive creation of inclusive organizational climates by examining strengths-based leadership practices grounded in positive psychology and supported by ethically implemented AI.

• Leah Hollis, Penn State College of Education
• Roderick Lee, Penn State Harrisburg, information systems

"Cyberbullying on Reddit: Enforcing Norms and Gaining Upvotes"

The researchers on this project will examine cyberbullying on the popular social media platform Reddit. They will collect data on bullying and investigate the prevalence and key themes involved in online bullying with the use of cutting-edge natural language processing AI technology.

• Diane Felmlee, Penn State College of the Liberal Arts
• Riley Tucker, Penn State College of the Liberal Arts

SSRI aims to foster novel, interdisciplinary collaborations by researchers who aim to address critical human and social problems at the local, national and international levels and to translate and disseminate this knowledge into measurable outcomes for human behavior, health and development.