The Faculty of Social Sciences and the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki invite applications for the position of

RESEARCH FELLOW (UNIVERSITY RESEARCHER) OR POSTDOCTORAL RESEARCHER FOR AI-SUPPORTED RESEARCH IN DIVERSITY, MIGRATION AND INCLUSION

for a fixed term period for the duration of 4 years, starting in January 2026 or as agreed.
The Faculty of Social Sciences and the Faculty of Science are looking for a shared researcher for the research action Diversity in Society and Life (DIVSOL). The task of the researcher is to study how AI as a transformative technology can support research on migration-related diversities and inequalities in contemporary societies. Relevant research areas include, but are not limited to, AI in the governance of migration, cross-border mobilities and transnational ties, work and services, institutional encounters, belonging, everyday lives and precarities as well as AI-related discrimination.
The position will also support strategic focus on the use of AI in social research. This includes, for instance, supporting the development of AI strategies for qualitative analysis.

QUALIFICATIONS

An ideal applicant has:

• A doctoral degree in a suitable field for the work to be carried out. Research experience after completing the doctoral degree is expected.
• Scientific competence in developing artificial intelligence methods, with proven publication record in scientific venues in the field, as well as programming skills. Publications in top-tier AI and NLP venues (e.g. NeurIPS, ICML, ICLR, JMLR, ACL, EMNLP, TACL) are considered a significant merit.
• Scientific interest and contributions in the given application domain, i.e., migration, inequality and diversity, again ideally with publications appearing in top-tier venues. Applicants with publications in a closely related field, but not exactly within the scope of the position, are asked to describe why their background is suitable for the position.
• Own scientific research interest in AI and/or the application domain. The scope of the methodological research is not specified by the call, but the candidates are expected to explain their own research interests and relate them to the specific topic of each position.
• Vision of what the role of AI is in the given application domain and an outline of planned research relating specifically to the use of AI in scientific research, for instance development of AI methods for commonly recurring tasks in the field, human-AI collaboration in scientific research, or development of open-source tools for AI4Science.
• Teaching skills.
• For Research Fellows (University Researchers), the ideal applicant has (in addition to the above listed requirements):A. Demonstration of other scholarly activity, such as evidence of independent research activity, the ability to lead a research group, activities in Finnish or international research groups or networks, and experience in the acquisition of research funding.B. Evidence of public engagement.

The candidate is expected to carry out their own research within the scope, typically working in collaboration with existing research groups at the university. In addition, all recruited personnel will be part of a joint “AI Virtual Lab” activity for supporting use of AI in scientific research, as a university-wide mechanism for driving the AI transformation. The Lab will involve roughly ten researchers, four of whom will jointly develop AI in scientific research in the context of DIVSOL. The candidate will also interact with various support services, e.g., research software engineers.
In addition, the candidate will actively contribute to teaching and administrative tasks (up to 5% of their working time annually). It is possible to complete the teaching and administrative tasks through English.