AI for Supporting Analysis of Qualitative Data - online

Description:

What will AI mean for the future of social research? Claims about the opportunities and risks abound. Meanwhile, there is evidence that government and funding bodies are becoming increasingly confident that this will mark a step change in the value, scale and replicability of social research. Are they ‘hallucinating’ (or worse) and, if so, with what consequences? Critical social researcher interrogation of these claims, the affordances, constraints and risks of AI is essential.

In this one-day course, Prof Les Carr (Web Science Institute, University of Southampton and Visiting Professor at CenSoF) will support researchers in critical exploration of generative AI (in particular large language models and chatbots) and in considering potential uses in participants’ own research. The session will start with a short introduction to how LLMs work and then we will open up to a hands-on-session where you explore your own research questions with some trial ‘data’. 

This course outlines the use of AI tools for the analysis of text data, which may have been generated through qualitative data collection (e.g. through interviews, focus groups etc) or through quantitative data collection, such as open-ended question(s) in surveys. 

The course covers:

• Use of Generative AI Chatbots (e.g. ChatGPT, Co-Pilot etc)

• Large Language Models (LLMs)

• Ethical and Responsible AI Issues

• Applying Chatbots (e.g. ChatGPT, Co-Pilot etc) to qualitative data for analysis (this can contain also text data from quantitative data collection methods)

• Prompt Engineering (i.e. the process of refining instructions and input prompts to guide LLMs, including tips on how to write prompts)

• Critical Evaluation of Research-Supported AI

Learning Outcomes:

By the end of the course participants will:

• Be confident users of Microsoft CoPilot or similar AI platform
• Understand the capabilities and limitations of LLM products
• Have experience in applying a Chatbot with qualitative data / text data
• Be able to critically analyse the costs/benefits/risks/opportunities of deploying AI in their research

Schedule:

This one day course will run between 10:00 - 17:00 with one hour for lunch. It will consist of a plenary morning workshop (teaching and discussion) and a practical individual session in the afternoon where each participant individually experiments with using CoPilot/ChatGPT on some of their research data (or relevant data of interest) with support and feedback from the course tutor.

• Introduction to the course
• Explain how generative AI and LLM models work
• Talk through the motivations for using AI and LLMs
• Research vignettes/case studies
• Discussion
• Hands on introduction to Copilot with simple worked examples.
• Break for lunch
• Open session where trainees individually experiment with their research questions and research data on Copilot, supported by trainers as necessary.
• Report back
• Planning for future work

Pre-requisites

Participants will need: (1) a laptop, (2) some pdf articles you haven’t got around to reading yet, (3) some research questions or data analyses that you'd like to try out with the LLM/Chatbot, and (4) access to an institutionally supplied AI Chatbot (such as Microsoft Copilot) or a personal subscription to a public service like ChatGPT.  

Presenter:

Leslie Carr is a Professor of Web Science in the School of Electronics and Computer Science. He is a Deputy Director of the Web Science Institute (WSI) that harnesses the University’s interdisciplinary, socio-technical expertise in online technologies towards tackling global challenges. He leads the AI@Southampton initiative, training and sharing research experience across researchers in all disciplines.

Cost:

The fee per teaching day is £60 per day for students / £150 per day for staff working for academic institutions, Research Councils and other recognised research institutions, registered charity organisations and the public sector / £350 per day for all other participants.

In the event of cancellation by the delegate a full refund of the course fee is available up to two weeks prior to the course. NO refunds are available after this date.

If it is no longer possible to run a course due to circumstances beyond its control, NCRM reserves the right to cancel the course at its sole discretion at any time prior to the event. In this event every effort will be made to reschedule the course. If this is not possible or the new date is inconvenient a full refund of the course fee will be given. NCRM shall not be liable for any costs, losses or expenses that may be incurred as a result of its cancellation of a course, including but not limited to any travel or accommodation costs.

The University of Southampton’s Online Store T&Cs also continue to apply.

Website and registration:

Register for this course

Region:

South East

Keywords:

Qualitative Data Handling and Data Analysis, Literature reviews, Writing Skills, AI, Generative AI, LLMs, Open-ended qualitative data, Text data

Related publications and presentations from our eprints archive:

Qualitative Data Handling and Data Analysis
Literature reviews
Writing Skills

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