Post Doc position in Game Analytics and Behavior Modeling at Northeastern University

Post Doctoral Fellow at the Playable Innovative Technologies Lab in College of Computer and Information Science at Northeastern University

We are seeking a postdoctoral fellow who will be working in a multidisciplinary area that combines Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, Modeling and Game Research. This position is funded by NIH and DoD grants and will be focused on modeling human behavior using data collected through multiple games. One of these games would be Foldit (http://fold.it/), which is a scientific discovery game; MarketPlace live (a team based educational marketing game), and Wuzzit Trouble (an educational game to teach kids Algebra). This project will be under supervision of two faculty members at CCIS, Northeastern University: Magy Seif El-Nasr (http://www.northeastern.edu/magy) and Seth Cooper (http://sethcooper.net/).

Postdoctoral fellows are expected to work under the supervision of Profs Cooper and Seif El-Nasr. We expect postdocs to also supervise students working on the projects involved as well as assist the supervisors in developing proposals to fund subsequent projects involving the data or the games being investigated.

The position is currently open and we will be accepting applications till the beginning of the Spring 2018.

The appointment will be for a year, but can be extended depending on available funding.

Qualifications:

• PhD in Computer Science or related area
• Be able to undertake substantial full-time research
• Be able to work under the supervision of a senior scholar
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Experience in Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence
• Motivated to publish and work collaboratively to write grants
• Experience in Reinforcement Learning and Inverse Reinforcement Learning is desirable
• Experience in game design and working with game data is desirable
• Proficiency in Matlab, R, programming language including: Java, C++, C#, Python or others is desirable

About our lab:

The PLAIT Lab (http://www.northeastern.edu/games/) has been formed in 2012 by members of the game design faculty in both College of Computer and Information Science as well as the College of Arts, Media and Design. The lab engages in multidisciplinary research that combines creation and analysis, creativity and scientific research, mixing arts, engineering and science. Faculty in this multidisciplinary lab often collaborate on multiple projects. Funding for these projects come from different sources including NSF, NIH, IARPA, DARPA, and local foundations and businesses. We have a regular weekly seminar where faculty, graduate students and undergraduate students from several departments across campus interested in games research culminated, play games, listen to talks and discuss many interesting research ideas.

Northeastern University is in the heart of Boston and a world leader in experiential learning. In the past several years, Northeastern University has made a major commitment to interdisciplinary education and research in select fields with the goal of achieving international leadership. Northeastern University is a vibrant community of researchers who often collaborate on many projects across campus. There are many avenues provided by Northeastern to encourage and facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration and intellectual discussions among faculty and students in different departments and colleges. Post Doctoral fellows who will join our lab will have the opportunity to engage with faculty and students in the PLAIT Lab and around campus.

If interest, please submit the following:

• Cover letter
• Research Statement
• CV

Email these to magy@neu.edu and seth.cooper@gmail.com