Our mission is to deepen our knowledge of technologies, societies, and what it means to be human by integrating research across traditional boundaries and building human-centred solutions that really make a difference.
We want to make sure powerful technologies truly make the world a better place—for everyone.
A professor in U of T’s Faculty of Information, Kelly Lyons was appointed in 2024 as the Schwartz Reisman Institute’s interim director.
Schwartz Reisman Chair in Technology and Society Gillian Hadfield has been selected by Schmidt Futures as an AI2050 senior fellow to solve hard problems in artificial intelligence through multidisciplinary research.
SRI Associate Director Sheila McIlraith co-leads the Embedded Ethics Education Initiative, integrating ethics into computer science courses, and coordinates our AI Safety discussion group.
Rhonda McEwen, specialist in information practices involving new media technologies and president of Victoria College, is part of our interdisciplinary community of faculty affiliates.
We believe humanity still has the power to shape the technological revolution in positive ways, and we’re here to connect and collaborate with the brightest minds in the world to make that belief a reality.
The integrative research we conduct rethinks technology’s role in society, the contemporary needs of human communities, and the systems that govern them. We’re investigating how best to align technology with human values and deploy it accordingly.
The human-centred solutions we build are actionable and practical, highlighting the potential of emerging technologies to serve the public good while protecting citizens and societies from their misuse.
Across all our activities, we convene world-class expertise and draw on diverse perspectives from universities, government, industry, and community organizations to develop new modes of thinking about powerful technologies and their role in what it means to be human in the 21st century.
We’re defining what’s possible, determining what’s at stake, and devising implementable solutions to make sure technologies like AI are effective, safe, fair, and beneficial—for everyone.
Institute Leadership
Gillian K. Hadfield
Schwartz Reisman Chair in Technology and Society
Gillian K. Hadfield is the Schwartz Reisman Chair in Technology and Society, professor of law and strategic management at the University of Toronto, and a Canada CIFAR AI Chair at the Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence. Her current research is focused on innovative design for legal and regulatory systems for AI and other complex global technologies; computational models of human normative systems; and working with machine learning researchers to build ML systems that understand and respond to human norms. Hadfield was the inaugural director of the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society from 2019 to 2023.
Kelly Lyons
Interim Director, Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society
Kelly Lyons is a professor in the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto, with a cross appointment to the Department of Computer Science. She is currently serving as interim director of the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society. Prior to joining the University of Toronto, she was the program director of the IBM Toronto Lab Centre for Advanced Studies. Lyons’ research interests include service science, knowledge mobilization, data science, and software engineering. Lyons is an IBM faculty fellow and a board member of CS-Can/Info-Can, Canada’s leading organization for the discipline of computer science.
Leadership Team
Gillian K. Hadfield
Chair
Law, economics, strategic management, legal and regulatory systems for AI, human-aligned AI, computational models of human normativity.
Kelly Lyons
Interim Director
Information, service science and service systems, data-driven knowledge mobilization, social media, collaborative work.
Monique Crichlow
Executive Director
Strategic management, public policy, data governance, privacy and trusted research infrastructure.
Peter Loewen
Associate Director
Political science, global affairs and public policy, decision-making, elections, governance, incorporating technology into governance.
Sheila McIlraith
Associate Director
Computer science, artificial intelligence sequential decision-making, human-compatible artificial intelligence.
Ashton Anderson
Research Lead
Computer science, computational social science, human-aligned artificial intelligence, social media and online social platforms, algorithms.
Beth Coleman
Research Lead
Science and technology studies, critical race theory, smart technology, machine learning, urban data, civic engagement.
Avi Goldfarb
Research Lead
Economics of technology, data science, artificial intelligence in healthcare, economics of privacy, digital marketing.
David Lie
Research Lead
Electrical & computer engineering, trusted computing hardware, mobile and embedded device security, computer security, technology and policy.
Nisarg Shah
Research Lead
Computer science, algorithmic economics, algorithmic fairness, social choice, multiagent systems, game theory, mechanism design.
Anna Su
Research Lead
Law, international human rights, constitutional law, public policy, AI governance, human rights and AI, digital constutionalism.
Karina Vold
Research Lead
Philosophy of mind, cognitive science, philosophy of technology and artificial intelligence, AI ethics and risk, data, digital tools.
Faculty Fellows
Boris Babic
Faculty Fellow, 2022–24
Philosophy, statistics, decision theory, epistemology, Bayesian interference, data science, machine learning, explainability and ethics of AI.
William Cunningham
Faculty Fellow, 2023–25
Psychology, social cognition, reinforcement learning, cognitive science, computational modeling, emotional and evaluative states.
Daniela Galatro
Faculty Fellow, 2023–25
Chemical engineering, applied chemistry, applied machine learning, causal modeling, data analysis, environment and health.
Shion Guha
Faculty Fellow, 2023–25
Computer science, computational social science, human-centered data science, human-computer interaction, AI and public policy/services, algorithmic bias.
Tegan Maharaj
Faculty Fellow, 2022–24
Computer science, human-computer interaction, ethics in AI, social justice.
Peter Marbach
Faculty Fellow, 2022–24
Online social systems, online social networks, recommendation algorithms, opinion dynamics, online markets, large-scale stochastic systems.
Lynette H. Ong
Faculty Fellow, 2022–24
Political science, autocracies, state power, repression, governance, contentious politics, developments.
Avery Slater
Faculty Fellow, 2023–25
Literature, poetry and poetics, ecocriticism, human and nonhuman language, technologies of language, histories of information and computation, artificial intelligence.
Postdoctoral Fellows
Hayane Dahmen
Postdoctoral Fellow
Economic law, public policy, competition policy, artificial intelligence, AI ethics, trade law, AI and antitrust laws, AI governance.
Toryn Qwyllyn Klassen
Postdoctoral Fellow
Computer science, artificial intelligence, AI safety, reinforcement learning, knowledge representation.
Atrisha Sarkar
Postdoctoral Fellow
Game theory, AI safety, automated vehicles, behavioural modelling, computational modelling.
Graduate Fellows
Taneea S. Agrawaal
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Computer science, human-computer interaction, climate modeling, ethics and explainability of AI, critical data studies, civic engagement, design for marginalized communities.
Michael Beauvais
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Law, data protection, children's studies, surveillance studies.
Hiu-Fung Chung
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Information, digital capitalism, Asian studies, social justice, algorithmic inequality, digital labour, political economy of platforms.
Michael Colacci
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Public health, health policy and evaluation, AI governance and safety, AI in healthcare, algorithmic fairness in clinical medicine.
Jamie Duncan
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Criminology and sociolegal studies, information policy, technology and data governance, technology in security, migration, and policing.
Alice Huang
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Philosophy, social and computational epistemology, cognitive science, computational modeling, equity and diversity, information infrastructures and social norms.
Blake Lee-Whiting
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Political science, politics of technology, survey research, political behaviour, automation.
Wenxi Liao
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Forestry and conservation, environment and health, computational modeling, human-centred data science, remote sensing, green infrastructure, urban environments.
Kelly McConvey
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Information, surveillance, algorithm design in education, algorithmic bias and fairness, human-centred data science.
Felix Menze
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Medical biophysics, computational neuroscience, simulated driving, public safety, cognitive impairment.
Ramaravind Kommiya Mothilal
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Information, fairness in sociotechnical systems, machine learning, social networks.
Jo-Ann Osei-Twum
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Public health, epidemiology, data science, AI in healthcare, predictive modeling for population health, public policy.
Silviu Pitis
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Computer science, machine learning, intelligent agent design, AI for social good, normative design of general purpose AI.
Emily Schwartzman
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Psychology, social perception, stereotyping, gender, discrimination, social cognition, AI for social justice.
Han Qiao
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Information, human-computer interaction, civic technology, sensemaking, data visualization, participatory design, urban planning, design justice.
Michael Zhang
Graduate Fellow, 2023–24
Computer science, neural network optimization, machine learning, AI safety.
Faculty Affiliates
Syed Ishtiaque Ahmed
Computer science, human-computer interaction, ethics in AI, social justice.
Benjamin Alarie
Law, law and technology, AI in public policy, decision-making.
Sharla Alegria
Race, gender and class, science knowledge and technology, organizations, occupations and work, AI and inequality.
Rohan Alexander
Information, statistical sciences, workflow analysis, natural language processing, multilevel regression with post-stratification.
Michelle Alexopoulos
Economics, macroeconomics, business cycles, growth and technological change, labour markets.
Meena Andiappan
Health policy and management, public health, normative ethics, analysis of emotion, organizational studies.
Samin Aref
Mathematical modeling, data science, applied machine learning, sociotechnical systems, computational social science.
Lisa Austin
Law, legal theory, law and technology, privacy and transparency legislation.
Venkat Bhat
Medicine, interventional psychiatry, mental health, digital and AI-driven therapeutic interventions, informatics, computational neuroscience.
Kristen Bos
Indigenous feminisms, science and technology studies, history, colonialism, environmental racism, data sovereignty, data justice.
Marsha Chechik
Computer science, safety and security in software engineering, automated verification, formal quality improvement methods, model management.
Steven Coyne
Moral and political philosophy, philosophy of law, AI ethics, ethics of technology, business ethics, ecofeminism.
Elliot Creager
Computer science, machine learning, algorithmic bias and fairness, deep learning.
Paul H. Dietz
Human-computer interaction, education, technology start-ups.
David Duvenaud
Computer science, AI safety, intelligent systems, generative models, automatic design, machine vision, energy forecasting.
John Enman-Beech
Law, contracts, law and society, queer and feminist legal theory, law and economics, employment law, consumer law, user law, platforms.
Marzyeh Ghassemi
Computer science, medicine, biomedical engineering, machine learning in healthcare, algorithmic fairness.
Jennifer Gibson
Health policy, organizational ethics in healthcare, public health, resource allocation in health, bioethics.
Igor Gilitschenski
Robotics and robot perception, automated vehicles, computer vision, machine learning, deep learning.
Paolo Granata
Communications, media ecology, medium theory, philosophy of technology, media ethics, digital equity.
Roger Grosse
Computer science, deep learning, Bayesian modeling, improving automated decision-making, human-aligned artificial intelligence.
Jason Hattrick-Simpers
Materials science, applied ML, autonomous science platforms, interpretability, statistical models, human-AI interaction.
Graeme Hirst
Natural language processing, computational linguistics, ethics of technology, AI in healthcare.
Diane Horton
Computer science, teaching ethics of technology, computer science education research, assessment.
Michael Inzlicht
Psychology, management, self-control, motivation, effort, social media, digital device overuse, political polarization, recreational drug use.
Tero Karppi
Social media, computational culture, software studies, affect theory, media theory.
Jonathan Kelly
Robotics, collaborative robots, robot perception, human-robot interaction, embodied intelligence, artificial general intelligence, safe AI systems.
Marlène Koffi
Economics, economics of machine learning, economics of innovation, economics of science, inequality, AI in public policy.
Rahul G. Krishnan
Machine learning in healthcare, causal inference, Bayesian and probabilistic modeling, trustworthy machine learning, computational tools for model auditing.
Anastasia Kuzminykh
Human-computer interaction, computer science, information science, explainable AI, ethical AI, human-AI collaboration, AI decision support, conversational UI.
Nicola Lacetera
Ethical and social support to markets, motivations for altruistic behaviour, behavioral economics, industrial and innovation economics.
David Liu
Computer science education, pedagogical software, software engineering
Carmen Logie
Sexually transmitted infections, mental health, intersectionality, global health, LGBTQ wellbeing, Northern and Indigenous youth wellbeing, refugees, displaced and asylum-seeking youth.
Chris Maddison
Computer science, machine learning, structure learning, Bayesian inference, numerical optimization, explainability and interpretability in artificial intelligence.
Kristina McElheran
Strategic management, business administration, organizational design and IT, digital economies, data-driven decision-making, technology start-ups.
Bree McEwan
Virtual reality, technological affordances, interpersonal communication, social media, social media data analytics, information diffusion, and polarisation/misinformation.
Rhonda McEwen
Communication, information technology, cultural studies, new media theory, interaction studies, human-machine communication, embodied cognition, virtual reality.
Anita McGahan
Strategic management, global affairs, public policy, industry change, sustainable competitive advantage, global health, global knowledge distribution.
Aleksandar (Sasho) Nikolov
Computer science, theories of computation, algorithm design, high dimensional geometry, differential privacy, data analysis.
Nicolas Papernot
Computer engineering, computer science, computer security, machine learning, privacy.
Vardan Papyan
Computer science, machine learning, deep learning, signal processing, high-performance computing, high-dimensional statistics, applied mathematics.
Toniann Pitassi
Computer science, fairness in artificial intelligence, information systems, biased data, computational complexity.
Jason Plaks
Social psychology, folk beliefs, moral decision making, human-robot interaction.
Matt Ratto
Information, human-computer interaction, intersections between humanities and engineering, modes of production, healthcare software and hardware.
Laura Rosella
Public health, epidemiology, biostatistics, big data in healthcare, analytics and risk in healthcare.
Frank Rudzicz
Computer science, signal processing, speech, language, machine learning, artificial intelligence in healthcare, entrepreneurship.
Shreyas Sekar
Data-driven optimization, revenue management and pricing, digital marketplace design, machine learning, e-commerce, information architecture design.
Leslie Regan Shade
Information and communication technologies, political economy, public policy, information infrastructures and social norms, digital privacy, equity and diversity, civic engagement.
Brian Cantwell Smith
Philosophy of computation, philosophy of artificial intelligence, philosophy of mind, cognitive science, computer science, artificial intelligence, metaphysics and ontology.
Robert Soden
Human computer interaction, computer-supported cooperative work, science and technology studies, humanitarianism, critical data studies, environmental data justice.
Abi Sriharan
Health technology, digital health policy, automation, digital labour, human-aligned AI, strategic management.
Suzanne Stevenson
Computational linguistics, cognitive science, psycholinguistics, machine learning of semantic and syntactic data, computation of human language acquisition.
Eva Vivalt
Economics, labour economics, development economics, forecasting, causal inference, external validity, decision-making.
Denis Walsh
Philosophy, history and philosophy of science, natural agency, evolution of systems, adaptation, evolution.
Bo Wang
Computer science, medicine, computational biology, computer vision, machine learning in health, privacy and personalized medicine.
Rosalie Wang
Rehabilitation science, occupational therapy, assistive and rehabilitation technology, technology development and evaluation, user-centred design, ethics, social and health equity.
Joseph Jay Williams
Human-computer interaction, applied machine learning, artificial intelligence, statistics, cognitive psychology, digital education, mental health.
Wendy H. Wong
Political science, international human rights, politics of organization, collective action, global governance of artificial intelligence.
Ningning Xie
Computer science, programming languages, compilers, type theory, logics, machine learning programming.
Jia Xue
AI for social justice, big data in social work, Twitter analysis in intimate and sexual violence research, human centered NLP, rape myth in China, computational social science.
Richard Zemel
Artificial intelligence and machine learning, algorithmic fairness, generative models of images and text, representation learning, meta-learning, causal models, graph-based machine learning.
Shurui Zhou
Computer science, software engineering, computational social science, open-source, collaborative software development, AI-based software, scientific software.
Visiting Scholars
Luke Stark
SRI Scholar-in-Residence
Affective computing, AI governance, algorithmic fairness, AI in public policy, critical data studies, ethics of AI, ethics of technology, human rights, media theory, science and technology studies.
Graduate Affiliates
Parand Alizadeh Alamdari
Computer science, artificial intelligence, AI safety, fairness in artificial intelligence, reinforcement learning.
Reem Ayad
Social psychology, moral psychology, moral judgment and decision making, human-robot interaction.
Alexander Bernier
Law, economics, regulatory strategies, biomedical research.
Madelaine Coelho
Technologically-facilitated violence, digital violence prevention, gamification in healthcare, global technology use, sociology of technology.
Sharon Ferguson
Computational social science, natural language processing, enterprise social networks, discrimination, engineering design.
Anne-Marie Fowler
Philosophies of temporality, ethics, philosophy of science, AI ethics, epistemology, human and AI learning.
Davide Gentile
Human factors, cognitive engineering, human-AI interaction, explainable artificial intelligence, applied statistics, behavioural data science.
Jessica Hall
Philosophy of science, philosophy of mind, philosophy of AI, metaphysics, foundations of computing, computation in physical systems, computation and intelligence.
Noam Kolt
Law, contracts, regulatory design, governance of artificial intelligence, consumer protection, data privacy, algorithmic fairness.
Daniel Konikoff
Criminology, police technologies, predictive justice, big data surveillance, social media and online social platforms, algorithmic inequality.
Morgan MacInnes
Political science, international relations, international security, geopolitics, security & technology, governance of technology, macro-history, statecraft.
Lillio Mok
Computer science, computational social science, human computer interaction, social computing, behavioural data science.
Shashank Motepalli
Computer science, distributed computing, blockchain, crypto-economics, governance, behavioural sciences.
Victoria Oldemburgo de Mello
Social psychology, social cognition, computational social science, social media and online social platforms.
Lief Pagalan
Public health, epidemiology, predictive modelling for population health, environment and health, health policy, equity and algorithmic fairness.
Wenjun Qiu
Privacy and security, mobile user privacy, natural language processing, artificial intelligence.
Mohammad Rashidujjaman Rifat
Post-secular HCI, CSCW, ethics, politics, pluralism, decolonizing data science, sustainability, content moderation, after-use phase of technologies.
Jad Sinno
Queer adult health, sexual and gender minority health, mental health, online dating apps, human-technology interactions.
Bilal Taha
Computer science, biometrics systems, affective computing, security and privacy, human-computer interaction.
Yuxing (Yolanda) Zhang
Critical data studies, AI ethics, media theory, platform studies, critical infrastructural studies, knowledge politics, digital labor, digital humanities.
Staff
Maggie Arai
Policy Researcher
David Baldridge
Policy Researcher
Daniel Browne
Associate Director, Research Engagement
Phil Dawson
Policy Lead
Olivia DiGiuseppe
Event Specialist
Jovana Jankovic
Research & Communications Specialist
Helena Ko
Business Officer
Anna Li
Research Engagement Officer
Ronalyn Lumbre
Administrative Assistant to Director
Simone Rodrigue
Executive Assistant and Events Coordinator
Jamie Sandhu
Policy Researcher
Marco Monteiro Silva
Associate Director, Marketing & Communications
