The Social Contagions, Artificial Intelligence, and Democracy workshop brings together scholars to explore how social contagions can be used to understand how AI and related digital technologies may challenge or, potentially, fortify democratic institutions and practices. Whether we like it or not, digital technologies are integral to our modern society and our everyday life. They mediate global connections through multi-scale networks for trade, human mobility, social interactions, and information sharing.
It can either contribute to or undermine personal health and well-being; the ability to create, access, and disseminate high-quality information; the free exchange of goods and services; and opportunities to participate in civil society. Contagion science provides a valuable viewpoint for understanding the process of how things—including information, beliefs and attitudes, and goods and services—transmit from one agent to another in these networks.
As such, we seek participation from broad cross-disciplinary perspectives including biological, computational, social, economic, behavioral, and political realms.
This workshop aims to 1) define external [to UVA] and internal resources on these topics, 2) foster conversation and collaboration within the UVA community, and 3) define directions for new research. Keynote speakers and panels will be followed by participatory discussion sessions.
Workshop Agenda
Opening remarks by Laurent Dubois
Keynote: Change: How To Trigger Tipping Points and Spread Big Ideas
Panel I – Social Contagion: Ali Ünlü, Hudson Golino, Paul Martin, Coleen Carrigan
Keynote: Synthetic Threats, Synthetic Solutions: Navigating the Generative AI Security Landscape
Panel II – Contagious Content?: Kevin Driscoll, Ben McCartney, Chirag Agarwal
Keynote: Designing and Validating LLM Simulations for Real-World Use
Panel III – Modeling & Measuring: Nicholas Landry, Anil Vullikanti
Summary: Keynote Speakers – moderated by Steven L. Johnson.
Networking Reception
