The Human Language Analysis Beings (HLAB) seek multiple RAs to work on building language, speech, and multi-modal foundational models of mental health symptom severity from natural language communication. Sitting at the intersection of NLP, longitudinal modeling, and cognitive and clinical psychology, responsibilities include data cleaning, developing and evaluating longitudinal NLP models, and presenting findings to an interdisciplinary team of computer scientists, psychiatrists, social scientists, and clinical psychologists. We are looking for candidates with a strong interest in publishing at top NLP venues (ACL, EMNLP, NAACL, AAAI, IJCAI) or interdisciplinary venues (npj Digital Medicine, npj Artificial Intelligence, JMIR, PLoS ONE). The positions may continue into the Fall.

About HLAB
Language originates with people — it reflects what we think, who we are, and how we feel. At HLAB, we study the person behind the language to advance both computer science and psychological science. Using an interdisciplinary approach, we leverage behavioral science and computational methods to improve AI language modeling while building data-driven frameworks for understanding health, well-being, and personality as expressed through language. HLAB is based at Vanderbilt University's College of Connected Computing, with active collaborations at Stony Brook University's Department of Computer Science, the World Well-Being Project (a research consortium spanning Stanford, NYU, Lund, and UPenn), and partner institutions. HLAB alumni have gone on to top industry labs — including Meta, Microsoft Research, Apple, and Twitter Cortex — and academic positions at Stanford, Carnegie Mellon, Dartmouth, and Cornell.

About the Opportunity. The Human Language Analysis Beings (HLAB) is currently recruiting PhD students to join our interdisciplinary research group under the advisement of H. Andrew Schwartz and Oscar Kjell. We are seeking applicants with strong backgrounds in both psychology and natural language processing.

Applicants should apply through either the Computer Science or Psychology PhD programs at Vanderbilt University. You can find detailed information for requirements on their websites (Psychological Sciences | Vanderbilt University, CCC | Vanderbilt University).

If you would like to speak with either advisor prior to applying, please email your CV and a brief research statement or cover letter to the Lab Manager, [email protected]. Use the subject line: “PhD Student Interest: [Your Name] – HLAB.”

We currently have an opening for an interdisciplinary postdoctoral researcher with experience in Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, and Psychology. Interested candidates should email [email protected] for more information.