[CogSci] Fwd: PhD Student Position on Leveraging Machine Learning to Improve Human Decision Making

[Falk Lieder]

The Max Planck Research Group for Rationality Enhancement (
https://re.is.tuebingen.mpg.de), headed by Dr. Falk Lieder at the Max
Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems in Tuebingen, Germany, is looking
for a Ph.D. student (m/f/d) for a project on *leveraging machine learning
and artificial intelligence to improve human decision making*.

The ability to make good decisions is an essential life skill. But making
good decisions is also really hard and good decision strategies are hard to
find. In this project we leverage state-of-the-art methods from machine
learning and artificial intelligence to develop *intelligent systems that
can discover and teach the optimal decision strategies* for different types
of human decisions, such as deciding what to work on, planning a project,
and managing one’s time. You will model the problem of deciding how to
decide in terms of rational meta-reasoning, combine deep reinforcement
learning and Bayesian program induction methods to discover optimal
decision strategies, build intelligent tutors that teach those strategies,
and conduct behavioral experiments to evaluate their efficacy at improving
people’s decision-making skills. You will be supported by an
interdisciplinary team of researchers and research assistants. The project
builds on our previous work on strategy discovery, meta-level reinforcement
learning, and intelligent tutors, and can rely on our infrastructure for
conducting behavioral experiments.

*The position *

The PhD student (m/f/d) will receive a PhD funding contract equivalent in
remuneration to pay group E13, 65% of the Collective Wage Agreement for the
Public Service. The successful applicant (m/f/d) should hold a M.Sc. degree
in computer science or a related discipline (e.g., AI, machine learning,
computational linguistics, statistics, or cognitive science) and have
strong programming skills, and a solid background in machine learning,
computational linguistics, artificial intelligence, or computational
cognitive science. Experience with some of the following is a plus but not
required: reinforcement learning, deep learning, deep reinforcement
learning, Bayesian inference, program induction, human decision-making, web
development, behavioral experiments. We would like to start this project as
soon as possible but the starting date is negotiable. The successful
applicant will be encouraged to join the International Max Planck Research
School for Intelligent Systems.


*The Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems* *in Tübingen*

The Max Planck Research Group for Rationality Enhancement is part of the MPI
for Intelligent Systems in Tuebingen, Germany. The institute is a
world-class center for foundational research in machine learning and
related areas. This position is also part of the Cyber Valley. The majority
of the institute’s scientific employees come from outside of Germany. You
will work among gifted students and experienced scientists from all over
the world; and have access to excellent infrastructure, including several
regular series of tutorials, lectures, journal clubs and invited talks by
international guests, as well as a large computer cluster, and dedicated
full-time specialists. The working language at the institute is English.

Tübingen is a scenic medieval university town, cradled in what is
simultaneously one of Germany’s most beautiful landscapes one of Europe’s
most economically successful areas. Stuttgart airport is an hour by bus,
Frankfurt airport can be reached in two hours by train. Most locals speak
English and knowledge of German is not required to live here.

*How to apply*

To apply, please email a cover letter, your CV, transcripts, your theses
and/or publications to re-jobs at tuebingen.mpg.de and arrange for at least
two letters of reference to be emailed to the same address. If you have any
questions about the project, our research group, or anything else, please
do not hesitate to contact Dr. Lieder at falk.lieder at tuebingen.mpg.de.

The Max Planck Society is committed to increasing the number of individuals
with disabilities in its workforce and therefore encourages applications
from such qualified individuals. The Max Planck Society strives for gender
equality and diversity. It seeks to increase the number of women in those
areas where they are underrepresented and therefore explicitly encourages
women to apply.

—

Falk Lieder, Ph.D.

Max Planck Research Group Leader for Rationality Enhancement

MPI for Intelligent Systems, Tübingen, Germany
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