RIT computing Ph.D. student earns prestigious SMART Scholarship to advance research into artificial intelligence and human performance

Rochester, New York – Cedric Bone, a doctoral student at Rochester Institute of Technology, is preparing for a career focused on one of the most difficult questions surrounding artificial intelligence: how people adapt to the systems they use. His research examines the way AI interfaces can affect human thinking, mental effort and the overall experience of interacting with technology.

That work has now earned Bone a major opportunity through the Science, Mathematics, and Research for Transformation, or SMART, Scholarship. The highly competitive program, offered through the Department of War, will fully fund his graduate education while also providing a path into government research after he completes his doctorate.

The SMART Scholarship follows a service-for-scholarship model. Students receive financial support for their degree programs and, in return, commit to working as civilian employees for the government for the same number of years as they received scholarship funding.

For Bone, that commitment will lead him to the Air Force Research Laboratory’s 711th Human Performance Wing at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio. He expects his research there to build directly on the work he is already doing at RIT, particularly his interest in understanding how AI systems affect the people operating them.

“Their investigators and research are top notch,” said Bone, who is from Williamsville, N.Y. “I think the research we’re going to conduct will definitely help with pilot wellness, especially related to cognitive load.”

Bone is pursuing his Ph.D. in computing and information sciences at RIT, where his research takes place in the Computational Linguistics and Speech Processing Lab. His work sits at the intersection of artificial intelligence and human-computer interaction, with a particular focus on what happens to people when they communicate with modern AI systems.

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One of the main areas he studies is cognitive load, or the amount of mental effort a person uses while completing a task. As AI becomes increasingly common in workplaces and other settings, the design of these systems can have a major influence on how easy or difficult they are to use.

Bone is particularly interested in open-ended systems based on large language models. He also studies a concept known as entrainment, which describes how people and AI agents can become more similar or different in the way they interact with one another.

“Right now, we don’t have good metrics for measuring entrainment in these interactions,” Bone said. “We want to know how to measure this, and ultimately how we can reduce cognitive load or increase it based on the context.”

Finding reliable ways to measure those effects requires more than simply asking people whether an AI system was easy or difficult to use. Bone conducts studies involving human participants and uses biophysiological sensors to collect physical signs that can provide clues about mental strain.

Among the tools used in his research are eye trackers and galvanic skin response monitors. The information gathered from those devices is combined with answers from participants to create a broader picture of how different AI interfaces affect mental effort and perceived synchrony during interactions.

That research also connects with Bone’s broader interest in making technology more accessible and useful for different groups of people.

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Earlier this summer, he worked at RIT on projects aimed at developing design guidelines for social robots that better serve deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals. He collaborated with graduate students from Gallaudet University who were at RIT through Universal AI, a National Science Foundation-funded research traineeship involving RIT and Gallaudet.

The SMART Scholarship is also not Bone’s first experience working with the Air Force Research Laboratory. He has previously completed summer internships at the laboratory’s location in Rome, New York, as well as at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Another internship at the Ohio facility is planned for next summer.

His future work at Wright-Patterson is expected to examine AI interfaces used by pilots operating autonomous vehicles. The goal is to make those systems more intuitive and responsive, potentially helping reduce the mental strain placed on pilots during demanding operations.

For Bone, the issue is especially important because cognitive fatigue can affect performance and may also contribute to pilot attrition. Better-designed interfaces could help people work with increasingly autonomous technology without placing unnecessary demands on their attention and mental resources.

Although his SMART Scholarship includes a two-year service commitment with the Air Force Research Laboratory, Bone expects that his relationship with the laboratory could last much longer. He sees government research as a place where his interests in AI, human interaction and emerging technologies can continue to develop.

He is also interested in augmented reality and in the broader question of how people will interact with computers as new forms of technology emerge. For Bone, the interface is not simply a layer placed on top of a computer system. It can shape how people understand and experience the technology itself.

“One thing my Ph.D. has reinforced is that the interface we use to interact with computers shapes almost every experience we have with technology,” he said. “As new interaction modalities emerge, I want to help make sure they are cognitively sustainable for everyone using them.”

Bone’s scholarship comes as RIT continues to expand research across computing and other disciplines. The university offers 14 doctoral programs, with its computing and information sciences Ph.D. designed to move beyond traditional computer science.

The program allows doctoral students to apply computing to practical problems in fields ranging from science and engineering to medicine, the arts, humanities, cybersecurity and business. Students combine theoretical knowledge with hands-on research, preparing them for careers in universities, government agencies and industry.

For Bone, the SMART Scholarship brings those elements together. His doctoral research at RIT has given him a foundation for studying the relationship between people and AI, while his upcoming work with the Air Force Research Laboratory will allow him to explore those questions in an environment where human performance can have significant consequences.

The scholarship therefore represents more than financial support for his remaining studies. It gives Bone a direct route from academic research into a government laboratory where his work on AI interfaces, cognitive load and human performance could help shape how people interact with increasingly autonomous systems.