Dr Niall Curry appointed as a UKRI Metascience AI Fellow

A linguist at Manchester Metropolitan University has been appointed as a UKRI Metascience AI Fellow and will lead a research project dedicated to understanding how Generative Artificial Intelligence is being used in research processes across the Social Sciences. The project is funded by the UKRI’s Metascience Unit – a team of policymakers, analysts and funding delivery specialists who work across UKRI and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology – and is entitled, “Developing disciplinarily situated recommendations for responsible GenAI use in the Social Sciences”.

Dr Niall Curry, Reader in Languages and Linguistics at the School of English and Co-Lead of the Manchester Centre for Research in Linguistics, designed the project to establish a critical perspective on AI use across the social sciences. The ultimate goal of the project is to develop discipline-specific guidelines for evaluating the use of AI in the research process. The project focuses on a number of areas in the Social Sciences, including Business and Economics, Education, and Linguistics. The project takes a bottom-up and participatory approach, bringing together different disciplinary voices to shape the future of AI use (or non-use) in the Social Sciences.

The project will see Dr Curry working closely with the UKRI Metascience Unit to inform the development of national policy for the use of AI in funded research. Dr Curry will also participate in international activities as part of the project, working with scholars funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation in the U.S.A. and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. You can find out more about the project here.