Senior Psychologist or Sociologist - AI Psychology & Safety

Core responsibilities:

• Research and develop practical guidelines and implementable safety frameworks informed by psychological principles to define AI model behavior that promotes positive outcomes and mitigates psychological harms
• Convert psychological frameworks into concrete evaluation protocols and red-teaming artifacts, collaborating with model development teams on safety fine-tuning and metric design
• Proactively identify and research potential psychological risks and ethical considerations arising from interactions between advanced AI and children, drawing on expertise in child development and related fields
• Work closely with AI researchers, ML engineers, and product managers to integrate psychological insights directly into the model training and deployment lifecycle

This role creates positive change by ensuring advanced AI models interact with people in healthy and developmentally appropriate ways, developing safety protocols that mitigate potential psychological harms and promote positive outcomes, particularly for vulnerable populations like children.

Required skills and experience:

• PhD in Psychology (Clinical, Developmental, Social, Cognitive), Human-Computer Interaction, Cognitive Science, or related fields
• Significant research experience in child development, adolescent psychology, attachment theory, social-emotional learning, Online Safety, or other relevant areas of applied psychology
• Experience working in a tech company, AI lab, or product-focused environment with familiarity with the AI development lifecycle and concepts like Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback (RLHF)
• Strong understanding of ethical principles relevant to psychological research and technology application, with ability to translate ambiguous psychological concepts into concrete technical requirements

Compensation and benefits include:

• US base salary range: $174,000 - $258,000
• Bonus and equity
• Comprehensive benefits package
• Commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion with equal employment opportunities
• Accommodations for disabilities or additional needs

Google DeepMind is a team of scientists, engineers, and machine learning experts working to advance artificial intelligence for widespread public benefit and scientific discovery, ensuring safety and ethics are the highest priority in their work.