Independent research and field-building. Remote-first, headquartered in Boston.
Futures Center / DigiNEST
DigiNEST (Digital Narratives and Emerging Story Technologies) asks how new tools and interfaces are changing authorship, agency, and participation in narrative spaces. The group analyzes across scholarship and practice — papers, design notes, postmortems, and media essays — then tests ideas with lightweight prompts or micro-prototypes. Our aim is twofold: sharpen shared vocabulary, and surface patterns that help builders create humane, non-extractive narrative spaces.
The group meets weekly and is co-hosted by Avery Lim, Molly Ann Kluck, and Jes Parent, with Jennifer Jiang as advisor. Recent reading sessions have engaged with work from MIT Media Lab's Fluid Interfaces, Cyborg Psychology, and AHA research groups. Papers discussed have included Minsol Kim et al.'s 'Reflective Agency: Ethical and Empirical Framework for AI-Mediated Self-Reflection Systems' and Anthropic's 'Persona Vectors' research on AI identity and behavioral steering.
The intern would contribute to the group's integrative review paper currently in progress — 'Toward Epistemic Agency in Everyday AI Use' — with possible focus areas including trust calibration in AI systems, metacognitive engagement with AI tools, and the material and ethical situatedness of AI use. DigiNEST is housed within the Futures Center and Society Ethics Technology working groups at JOPRO.
Students with backgrounds in HCI, communication studies, media studies, cognitive science, STS, psychology, or digital humanities. Interest in how AI systems shape narrative, identity, and self-reflection is essential. Familiarity with current AI research is a plus but not required.
Or email start@jopro.org with your statement of interest and CV.