SOM researcher explores cutting-edge topics in artificial intelligence and e-healthcare

Amazon Alexa knows you well, but do you know her well? Jinglu Jiang, an assistant professor in the School of Management, explores this question and more through her work in the field of management information systems (MIS).

With a deep passion for research, Jiang studies the relationship between humans and intelligent agents to understand how technology affects people on an individual level as well as within a team. Intelligent agents are artificial intelligence (AI) entities, such as Alexa and Siri, that run a service autonomously and augment human decisions based on input and data from their environment.

“When I do this research, my goal is to find out the mechanism behind it,” she says. “What are the motivating factors that contribute to a person’s behavior online? »

It’s no secret that technology influences human behaviors and that intelligent agents can learn from people’s behaviors and adapt to the situation – but what exactly happens during this exchange?

Drawing on theories from fields such as sociology and psychology, Jiang conducts research to understand human-agent interactions in various contexts such as digital healthcare and team decision-making. This is how she better understands how, for example, people interact with their Fitbit or why patients can rely on Siri to create reminders on their iPhone.

“My main goal is to create or extend my own theory of human-agent interaction,” says Jiang.

Jiang’s recent contribution to the field of GIS has been a theoretical contribution published in Quarterly GIS. She and her colleagues have proposed a theoretical framework that explains how IT can facilitate various steps and elements of chronic disease self-management. This framework can be used to design information technology-based self-monitoring interventions that could potentially lead to greater adherence to chronic care interventions.

Jiang and several colleagues also recently published an article in Information system

Borders which attempted to clarify why patients have developed a lack of trust in online health care, addressing both those who do not use online medical consultation and those who use it and end up Stop. Jiang and his colleagues learned that many patients did not believe they would receive the best possible care, both from an interpersonal and technological perspective.

In addition to these papers, Jiang’s research on digital healthcare and human-agent interaction has also been published in a number of research publications such as MIT Sloan Management Review, Information processing and management and the Journal of Internet Medical Research.

A passion for investigation

While completing her bachelor’s degree in China, Jiang was introduced to research through an undergraduate exchange program at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada. She enjoyed it and eventually returned to Queen’s for a master’s degree.

As a doctoral student at HEC Montréal, she became interested in research on the managerial aspects of IT and IT-assisted decision-making. His research has focused on how people digitize themselves and their lives, and how this influences individual productivity and team effectiveness.

Jiang expects to study other topics in the field of human-agent interaction in the future. She still enjoys the act of research, which she describes as the fun part of her job.

“It’s an internal driver, my passion and interest,” says Jiang. “I am willing to spend 12 hours a day on a research project because I always find it interesting to investigate certain research questions.”

She believes that a certain attitude and work ethic are required in research. It’s a lesson she learned from one of her mentors when she was a graduate student.

“You have to question the attitude you have,” says Jiang. “When you do your research project, are you task-oriented? Or do you really want to know the facts and knowledge behind a subject and put in the effort to prove it? If you see it only as a task that you have to do, you cannot succeed as a lifelong seeker.