Richard Landers on Psychologists' Involvement in AI Development

Richard Landers, faculty, discussed the necessity of balancing technological innovation and humanity in a recent magazine article published by the American Psychological Association.

The article, “Bringing Psychological Expertise Into AI Development,” addressed how artificial intelligence (AI) has been a rising force in the modern business world, bringing great potential while also often creating significant risks. For instance, despite common expectations that bias could be engineered out of AI, real-world AI systems have often perpetuated discriminatory bias when screening job application documents such as résumés. Landers stressed that unfair screening has long been an issue for hiring systems with solutions studied extensively by psychologists. He contended that AI developers are generally unaware or unready to integrate the vast, relevant, existing research on such issues, recommending that developers work with psychologists from the outset when trying to address complex human-related problems with AI.

According to Landers, psychologists understand human complexity, how to avoid and mitigate harm, and how to act ethically in relation to people. They can provide value throughout the development and launch process, and they can fulfill several roles within that span, including auditing AI for compliance with psychological and ethical standards, offering qualitative feedback from a human standpoint, and simulating potentially dangerous conversations with AI models to test safeguards.

Ultimately, Landers emphasized the value that can come from combining AI innovation with a psychology-centered approach and urged psychological scientists to remain informed on AI development and open to becoming involved with it.