Human-Centered AI Intern, Computational Social Science
At Toyota Research Institute (TRI), we’re on a mission to improve the quality of human life. We’re developing new tools and capabilities to amplify the human experience. To lead this transformative shift in mobility, we’ve built a world-class team advancing the state of the art in AI, robotics, driving, and material sciences.
This is a Summer 2026 paid 12-week internship opportunity. Please note that this internship will be a hybrid in-office role.
Please note that this internship will be a hybrid in-office role. We welcome applicants from fields such as computational social sciences, computer sciences, social sciences, psychology, organizational behavior, sociology, behavioral economics, human factors, or related disciplines, provided they have strong methodological training and interest in collective wellbeing.
The Team
This internship opportunity falls within the Harmonious Communities Department in the Human-Centered AI Division (HCAI). Our research aims to understand, simulate, and shape wellbeing in complex, real-world systems, including workplaces, communities, and organizations. In addition to examining individual behavior, we study how wellbeing emerges, is distributed, and changes over time across groups, and how organizational structures, technologies, and policies can support collective outcomes now and into the future.
We are an integrated team of behavioral scientists, machine-learning researchers, and human-computer interaction experts. Our research leverages use cases to push state-of-the-art in disciplinary thinking.
The Internship
We are looking for a Computational Social Science (or similar) intern to help create and advance tools that support data-driven exploration of possible futures. The project will involve conceptual work, quantitative analysis, and system design with an emphasis on multilevel thinking. It will involve exploration of questions such as the following:
What are new ways of extracting insight from data using contemporary AI systems?
How do we extract plausible, possible and impossible futures from data?
How do we communicate future scenarios in ways that inspire curiosity, deeper thinking, and action?
The strongest candidates will be generalists, flexible problem solvers, and ideally have experience in at least two of these areas: data science or machine learning, HCI, information visualization, and software engineering. This internship is well-suited for candidates who are excited to build prototype solutions and take on high-risk, high-reward challenges outside of the academic research setting. Bonus points for experience in Future-of-Work research.
Over the course of the project, in addition to Harmonious Communities group meetings, you will also participate in all Human-Centered AI Division meetings, and broader TRI events. You will be exposed to how interdisciplinary industrial research works and learn from our team and the other interns in our division. Furthermore, you will engage in strategy discussions about how your internship research project connects to business impact at Toyota.
Responsibilities
Qualifications
Please add a link to Google Scholar and include a full list of publications and presentations when submitting your CV to this position.
The pay range for this position at commencement of employment is expected to be between $45 and $65/hour for California-based roles, and between $40 and $58/hour for Massachusetts-based roles. Base pay offered will depend on multiple individualized factors, including, but not limited to, business or organizational needs, market location, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. TRI offers a generous benefits package including medical, dental, and vision insurance, and paid time off benefits (including holiday pay and sick time). Additional details regarding these benefit plans will be provided if an employee receives an offer of employment.
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