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Research project

SafeSpacesNLP

Project overview

We will explore the use of Socio-Technical Natural Language Processing (NLP) for classifying behavioural online harms within online forum posts (e.g. bullying; drugs & alcohol abuse; gendered harassment; self-harm), especially for young people. Our socio-technical AI will explore both zero-shot and graph-based NLP algorithms for behaviour classification, using a cyclic socio-technical methodology. This approach will facilitate incremental use of human feedback for iterative learning and re-ranking, overcoming the limited training data issue and keeping a 'human in the loop'. We follow an inclusive multi-disciplinary research approach, integrating stakeholders into our experiments from the start.

Staff

Lead researchers

Dr Stuart Middleton

Associate Professor

Research interests

  • Natural Language Processing
  • Human-in-the-loop NLP: Active Learning, Adversarial Training, Rationale-based Learning, Interactive Sense Making
  • Information Extraction: Few/Zero Shot Learning, Graph-based Models, Behaviour Classification, Geoparsing/Location Extraction, Event Extraction, Argument Mining
Connect with Stuart

Email: sem03@soton.ac.uk

Collaborating research institutes, centres and groups

Research outputs

ConversationMoC: encoding conversational dynamics using multiplex network for identifying moment of change in mood and mental health classification
Loitongbam Gyanendro Singh, Stuart E. Middleton, Tayyaba Azim, Elena Nichele, Pinyi Lyu & Santiago De Ossorno Garcia, 2024
Type: conference
Implementing responsible innovation: the role of the Meso-level(s) between project and organisation
Bernd Carsten Stahl, Virginia Portillo, Hanne Wagner, Peter J. Craigon, Dimitrios Darzentas, Santiago De Ossorno Garcia, Liz Dowthwaite, Chris Greenhalgh, Stuart E. Middleton, Elena Nichele, Christian Wagner & Helena Webb, 2024, Journal of Responsible Innovation, 11(1)
DOI: 10.1080/23299460.2024.2370934
Type: article
On the legal aspects of responsible AI: adaptive change, human oversight, and societal outcomes
Daria Onitiu, Vahid Yazdanpanah, Adriane Chapman, Enrico Gerding, Stuart E. Middleton & Jennifer Williams, 2023
Type: conference
Identifying key challenges and needs in digital mental health moderation practices supporting users exhibiting risk behaviours to develop responsible AI tools
Elena Nichele, Anita Lavorgna & Stuart Middleton, 2022, SN Social Sciences, 2(10), 217
DOI: 10.1007/s43545-022-00532-3
Type: article
Detecting moments of change and suicidal risks in longitudinal user texts using multi-task learning
Tayyaba Azim, Gyanendro Singh Loitongbam & Stuart Middleton, 2022
DOI: https://aclanthology.org/2022.clpsych-1.19/
Type: conference