Faculty Focus: Dr. Kuanchin (KC) Chen

WMU research team awarded National Science Foundation Grant

A Western Michigan University interdisciplinary team has been awarded a four-year, $500,000 National Science Foundation grant to research artificial intelligence (AI) readiness through cyber training. The project is responding to the calls from the National Science and Technology Council to link psychology and behavioral and technical disciplines in AI research. The research team brings together expertise from both the Haworth College of Business and WMU’s College of Engineering and Applied Sciences.

“The uniqueness of this project involves innovations surrounding key AI and cyberinfrastructure (CI) that specifically address two focus areas: encouraging broad adoption of AI and CI techniques to enhance researchers’ abilities and integrating core literacy and discipline-appropriate skills in data-driven methods for advancing research,” says Dr. Kuanchin (KC) Chen, director of WMU Haworth’s Center for Business Analytics and professor of computer information systems. “The project will build a skill set in areas such as safe, secure and reliable AI; human-AI interactions and the impact on society; machine learning paradigms; smart technologies; AI techniques for STEM professionals; explainable AI; trust in AI; and scientific discovery with AI.”

The interdisciplinary research team is comprised of computer science and information systems experts who will fuse technical and behavioral knowledge.

As AI technologies become increasingly pervasive, the American AI Initiative has called for workforce development with AI. Up to 47% of U.S. jobs fall in the high-risk category and could be affected by AI, according to Frey & Osbourne’s research in Technological Forecasting and Social Change. Routine tasks are being replaced by technology rapidly, and 94% of WMU students surveyed in Chen’s classes agree that their jobs will be affected by AI in some way. Numerous reports from private and government sources have consistently projected gaps in the supply and demand for skilled labor in AI.

Recent AI developments have shown AI’s potential for disruption and even harmful results. Chen explains how training is essential in readying the workforce to manage this rapidly evolving technology. “Unfortunately, AI is not like other products where the functionality is well understood by the general public. Different vendors sell AI products with varying capabilities, but a trained eye is required to decipher the difference across these products.”

The research project will demonstrate how social science theories can enrich methodologies to create a solution that goes beyond technological soundness alone—resulting in an AI-empowered workforce, backed by evidence-based theories.