RESEARCH TRACK

AI on the Ground

We use social science to develop robust analyses of AI systems; effectively assess the impact of AI systems; and inform future design, use, and governance.

About

We study how AI systems and everyday practices shape one another. Rather than starting from abstract principles or preset categories of harms or promises, our research begins with understanding the organized settings in which AI is designed, built, procured, and used.

Our projects interrogate the infrastructural and social conditions that make AI systems possible and how they are sustained and governed in practice, with particular attention to the judgments, tensions, and adaptations that shape ongoing implementation. 

Our research spans those who build and procure systems and those who use and are affected by them. We believe that the impact of AI systems and policies can only be fully understood by observing, listening, and speaking with people on the ground — from government and industry practitioners, to scientists and engineers, to community members and activists.

Across institutional, professional, and community settings, we are committed to producing empirical insights to support AI policy, design, and oversight. We aim not only to critique AI systems, but to offer practical tools for more reflexive and responsible sociotechnical practice in making sense of AI.

Focus Areas

SOCIAL DYNAMICS OF INTEGRATION

We research how organizations and cultures change when AI systems are introduced, with a focus on ethical practices and local reconfigurations of power and responsibility.

FRAMEWORKS OF ACCOUNTABILITY

We evaluate and develop new ways to hold builders and users of AI — and algorithmic systems — accountable across domains. These include business and consumer technologies, governmental use of AI, and “AI for good.”

PRACTITIONERS AND PUBLICS 

We work to deepen public understanding of what AI is, how it is used and governed, and why it matters. We convene practitioners and the public to co-develop tools, and create forums for reflective practice and shared language to understand AI impacts.

Chatbots for Therapy and Mental Health

AI, Science, and the Future of Knowing

AI in the Majority World

Mentions and Press

Additional Research

Team Members

All Work

  • Primer
    Data & Society
    This collaboration between Lana Swartz, Alice E. Marwick, and Kate Larson maps generative AI's role in scams, the communities most at risk, and the broader economic and cultural shifts at play. Read more
    May 2025
  • Primer
    Data & Society
    A resource by Sareeta Amrute, Ranjit Singh, and Rigoberto Lara Guzmán exploring the presence of artificial intelligence and technology in the Majority World. 160 thematic works, available in English and Spanish, curated in collaboration with Aishatu Gwadabe, Dibyadyuti Roy, Kimberly Fernandes, Murali Shanmugavelan, Nicolás Llano Linares, Paola Ricaurte Quijano, Soledad Magnone, and Vasundhra Dahiya. Read more
    September 2022
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