Postdoc position in Socially Aware AI with focus on engineering social simulations

The Department of Computing science seeks a postdoc who will work with the socially aware AI group. The employment is full-time for two years with starting date of September 1, 2022 or by agreement.

For our department characterized by world-leading research in several scientific fields and a multitude of educations ranked highly in international comparison we now look for a Postdoc in social simulations of organizations in extreme contexts (such as pandemics, terrorist attacks, mountaineering, etc.). The department has been growing rapidly in recent years where focus on an inclusive and bottom-up driven environment are key elements in our sustainable growth. Our workplace consists of a diverse group from different nationalities, background and fields. If you work as a postdoc with us you receive the benefits of support in career development, networking, administrative and technical support functions along with good employment conditions. See more information at:

https://www.umu.se/en/department-of-computing-science/ 

You will be based in the socially aware AI (SAAI) group (https://www.umu.se/en/research/groups/socially-aware-ai/). This group is world famous for its work on sophisticated social simulations ranging from the effectiveness of restrictions in the covid crisis to support for sustainable neighbourhoods. The group is specifically well-known for its formalizations and implementations of social concepts that govern people’s lives, such as routines, practices, norms, conventions, roles, etc. With this position we aim to develop multi-agent systems in which the agents are influenced by norms and other social rules, while learning from their experience using these social concepts and thus also slowly shaping new norms and conventions. The theoretical foundations will be based on existing work from our group, but especially the interaction between learning behaviour and social rules is to be explored. In order to test the usability of the developed models we aim to have at least one use case related to social simulation for policy making.

Is this interesting for you? Welcome with your application before July 6, 2022

The successful candidate is expected to contribute to research in SAAI by creating tools with which social constructs like norms and practices can be designed and implemented for social simulations. It is important to make a link between social theories and computational structures. The social theory is needed to create general usable computational tools, while the computational tools should be usable and efficient. Part of the research will be the connection of empirical, ethnographic methodologies with agent based social simulation methodologies.

This position is funded by the Wallenberg AI, Autonomous Systems and Software Program (WASP) is Sweden’s largest individual research program ever, a major national initiative for strategically motivated basic research, education and faculty recruitment. The program addresses research on artificial intelligence and autonomous systems acting in collaboration with humans, adapting to their environment through sensors, information and knowledge, and forming intelligent systems-of-systems. The vision of WASP is excellent research and competence in artificial intelligence, autonomous systems and software for the benefit of Swedish industry. Read more: https://wasp-sweden.org/

To be appointed under the postdoctoral agreement, the postdoctoral fellow is required to have completed a doctoral degree or a foreign degree deemed equivalent to a doctoral degree. This qualification requirements must be fulfilled no later than at the time of the appointment decision.

To be appointed under the postdoctoral agreement, priority should be given to candidates who completed their doctoral degree, according to what is stipulated in the paragraph above, no later than three years prior. If there are special reasons, candidates who completed their doctoral degree prior to that may also be eligible. Special reasons include absence due to illness, parental leave, appointments of trust in trade union organisations, military service, or similar circumstances, as well as clinical practice or other forms of appointment/assignment relevant to the subject area. Postdoctoral fellows who are to teach or supervise must have taken relevant courses in teaching and learning in higher education.

Applicants should:

• Have a PhD in Computer Science or Mathematics
• Have a good knowledge of formal methods such as logic and mathematics and experience in agent based social simulations with cognitive agents
• Be fluent in English
• Have proven skills to write papers for top journals and conferences and give presentations for diverse audiences

The following are additional desirable qualifications:

• Experience in software engineering
• Interest and if possible experience in interdisciplinary research

Desirable personal skills:

• Have the ability of working independent and as part of a research group
• Good interpersonal skills.

A full application should include:

• Personal letter (gives a motivation why you apply and plans for the research, max 2 pages),
• Curriculum vitae (CV) with publication list,
• A report on past and ongoing research interest with relevance for the position (max two pages)
• Certified copy of doctoral degree certificate or documentation that clarifies when the degree of doctor will likely be obtained,
• Certified copies of other diplomas, list of completed academic courses and grades,
• Copy of doctoral thesis and a maximum of five relevant articles,
• Contact information (including e-mail address) for at least two reference persons,
• Other documents that the applicant wishes to claim.

The application must be written in English (preferably) or Swedish. The application is made through our electronic recruitment system. Documents sent electronically must be in Word or PDF format. Log in to the system and apply via the button at the end of this page. The closing date is July 6, 2022

Further details are provided by prof. Frank Dignum ([email protected])