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Job Description
Postdoctoral Researcher:
Mental Models for Human Behavior Understanding Honda Research Institute USA San Jose, CA Job Details Contract 2 hours ago Qualifications Computational research Design of experiments Computational modeling Research project design Collaborative research Doctor of Philosophy Prototype creation Research data analysis Computer skills Machine learning frameworks Prototypes Cross-functional communication
Full Job Description Job Number:
P25T04 Honda Research Institute USA (HRI-US) is seeking a Postdoctoral Researcher to advance interpretable and human-centered AI systems that can model, reason about, and adapt to human behavior. This research-focused role sits at the intersection of AI, neuroscience, cognitive science, human-AI interaction, robotics, and machine learning. The successful candidate will develop computational approaches for understanding human goals, beliefs, preferences, uncertainty, and interaction patterns, with the aim of building AI systems that are more adaptive, transparent, and aligned with people in real-world settings. San Jose, CA Key Responsibilities Conduct original research on human behavior modeling, including how cognitive, social, emotional, and physical aspects of human behavior can be represented and inferred by AI systems. Develop methods that enable AI agents to reason about human goals, intentions, preferences, uncertainty, and changing context during interaction. Design approaches for building AI systems that can reflect on the reliability of their human models, update them over time, and adapt when observations or feedback suggest the model is incomplete. Investigate interpretable mechanisms for analyzing model behavior, such as probing, representation analysis, causal intervention, activation analysis, or related techniques. Build and evaluate research prototypes that support human-aware reasoning in domains such as interactive assistants, robotics, mobility, augmented reality, decision support, or other real-world AI systems. Develop evaluation benchmarks, experimental frameworks, and analysis pipelines for studying human-aware AI behavior. Collaborate with multidisciplinary teams across AI, cognitive science, HCI, robotics, and related areas. Contribute to publications, research prototypes, and intellectual property that demonstrate scientific and technical impact. Minimum Qualifications Ph.D. completed by the start date in Computer Science, Cognitive Science, Neuroscience, Psychology, Linguistics, Robotics, HCI, Applied Mathematics, Physics, or a related field. Strong research ability demonstrated through peer-reviewed publications, research prototypes, open-source contributions, or equivalent research output. Solid foundation in machine learning, artificial intelligence, computational modeling, cognitive modeling, human behavior modeling, or a closely related area. Experience formulating research questions, designing experiments, analyzing results, and communicating findings clearly. Strong programming and prototyping skills, preferably in Python and modern machine learning or data analysis frameworks. Strong communication and collaboration skills, including interest in working across interdisciplinary research areas. Bonus Qualifications Experience in one or more of the following areas: Human behavior and partner modeling: modeling human goals, intentions, preferences, beliefs, uncertainty, social behavior, or theory of mind.
Interpretable machine learning:
analyzing representations, model internals, reasoning behavior, failure modes, or causal mechanisms in neural systems.
Cognitive or computational modeling:
connecting ideas from cognitive science, neuroscience, psychology, or social cognition to artificial intelligence systems.
Agentic systems and memory:
experience with planning, reflection, self-correction, memory architectures, or adaptive reasoning frameworks. Publications or research contributions in relevant venues such as NeurIPS, ICML, ICLR, CVPR, ICCV, ECCV, ACL, EMNLP, AAAI, CogSci, CHI, HRI, RSS, CoRL, ICRA, or related conferences and journals. Interest in building AI systems that are interpretable, human-aware, adaptive, and useful in real-world human-centered settings. Desired Start Date 7/6/2026 Contract Duration 2 years
Position Keywords Human Behavior Understanding, Human-centered AI, Interpretable AI Warning:
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