Research Fellowship

Who should apply

Social scientists who care about AI safety and want to do rigorous empirical work on it.

We are looking for researchers at any career stage, from undergraduates to postdocs, who study how people and institutions reason about AI, trust it, use it, and are changed by it. Our focus is psychology, economics, and sociology, and we welcome researchers from communication, anthropology, cognitive science, and linguistics.

SIRA is about empirical social science (experiments, surveys, interviews, ethnography, and quantitative modeling), not regulatory policy design. Policy asks “what rules should govern this?” We ask “what is actually happening?”

The program

Mentors are confirmed first. Fellows then apply and are matched in one of two ways.

We offer

• Mentorship from researchers in academia and industry who work on AI safety from a social science angle.
• Research management. A dedicated research manager helps you scope a project you can finish in the program and keeps you on track.
• Seminars and speakers covering both technical AI safety and the social sciences, so you get context beyond your mentor’s specialty.
• An in-person cohort. Working alongside other fellows every day is a large part of what makes short programs like this work.
• Financial support. A stipend, housing, travel, and research funds, so cost isn’t a barrier to taking part.
• A closing symposium where you present your work to mentors and the wider AI safety community.

Example research questions

These illustrate the kind of work fellows might take on. The questions are relevant whether transformative AI arrives soon or later.

• PsychologyAs AI becomes the default aid for everyday judgment, how does that shift human epistemic autonomy and vulnerability to manipulation?
• EconomicsWhat incentive structures drive frontier labs to underinvest in safety under racing dynamics, and which near-term market interventions could shift them?
• SociologyDrawing on the sociology of organizational disaster, how do AI labs normalize risk over time, and which interventions reduce that tendency?
• CommunicationHow do AI-generated content and persuasion degrade the information ecosystem in ways that weaken society’s ability to coordinate a response to AI risk?
• Political economyHow does near-term labor disruption from AI affect public and political support for AI safety regulation?
• PsychologyOver generations, how does handing cognitive and moral judgment to AI affect human agency and our capacity to oversee increasingly capable systems?

Timeline

The fellowship is currently a proposal. Here is how we plan to get to a first cohort.

1. Now

   Feedback and interest

   Gather feedback from the AI safety community and gauge interest from prospective fellows and mentors.

2. Next

   Partners and funding

   Secure a host fellowship or co-working space, confirm mentors, and raise program funding.

3. Summer 2027

   First cohort

   Applications open once mentors are confirmed. The first cohort of 15–20 fellows runs for 12 weeks.