Robustness

Goal Orientation for Fair Machine Learning Algorithms

A key challenge facing the use of Machine Learning (ML) in organizational selection settings (e.g., the processing of loan or job applications) is the potential bias against (racial and gender)...

Robust Analytics Lab
22 Jan 2024

Working Paper - Theorizing about the Complexity of Privacy Phenomena - A Configurational Approach

We posted on SSRN a working paper by Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, addressing challenges facing the theorization of complex privacy phenomena.

Robust Analytics Lab
06 Nov 2023

Reducing Adverse Impact Through Machine Learning

Machine learning has emerged as a popular tool for personnel selection, leveraging data to enhance hiring processes. An article forthcoming at Personnel Psychology studies the potential of machine learning in...

Robust Analytics Lab
01 Jun 2023

Fair Ratemaking for Catastrophe Insurance

Catastrophe insurance is an important element of disaster management. Yet the historical presence of inequalities in insurance, from redlining to pricing disparity, has had a devastating impact on minority communities....

Robust Analytics Lab
07 Dec 2022

Provost’s Distinguished Lecture

Professor Heng Xu will be featured in one of the two events in the Fall 2022 Provost’s Distinguished Lecture Series in American University. She will deliver a talk titled “What...

Heng Xu
12 Oct 2022

Talks at MPI Sympoisium

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang will speak at the Interdisciplinary Symposium on Human and Societal Aspects in Computing organized by the Max Planck Institute for Security and Privacy on October 25-26, 2022, in Bochum, Germany.

Robust Analytics Lab
11 Oct 2022

Change Can't Wait San Francisco Panel on AI Governance

Professor Heng Xu joined a panel of experts to discuss AI Governance in the Change Can’t Wait San Francisco event on March 11, 2022.

Heng Xu
11 Mar 2022

Working Paper - Fairness of Ratemaking for Catastrophe Insurance

We posted on SSRN a working paper by Nan Zhang and Heng Xu, addressing the problem of fair ratemaking in catastrophe insurance.

Robust Analytics Lab
01 Mar 2022

Organic Data and the Design of Studies

We recently published a book chapter, “Organic Data and the Design of Studies”, in collaboration with Dr. Le Zhou (University of Minnesota), in Data, Methods and Theory in the Organizational...

Robust Analytics Lab
01 Mar 2022

Fairness in AI Project

We gratefully acknowledge the National Science Foundation and Amazon for their generous support of our project “Using Machine Learning to Address Structural Bias in Personnel Selection”, which was selected as part of the NSF Program on Fairness in Artificial Intelligence...

Robust Analytics Lab
25 Jan 2021

Reconcile Paradoxical Findings Through an Analytical Lens

In an article forthcoming at MIS Quarterly, we launched an interdisciplinary inquiry into the feasibility of leveraging advanced analytical techniques to collectively reason about the conflicting findings in behavioral research....

Robust Analytics Lab
16 Jan 2021

CACM Research Highlight

In the research highlights section of the February 2021 issue, Communications of the ACM (CACM) published an article co-authored by Nan Zhang, “Scalable Signal Reconstruction for a Broad Range of Applications”.

Nan Zhang
15 Jan 2021

Disentangling Effect Size Heterogeneity in Meta-analysis - A Latent Mixture Approach

An article co-authored by Nan Zhang, Mo Wang, and Heng Xu was recently accepted for publication at Psychological Methods. In the article, we leveraged the recent advances in theoretical machine...

Robust Analytics Lab
05 Sep 2020

Working Paper - Implications of Data Anonymization on the Statistical Evidence of Disparity

We posted on SSRN a working paper by Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, addressing the implications of data anonymization on the statistical evidence of disparity.

Robust Analytics Lab
28 Jul 2020

Working Paper - From Contextualizing to Context-Theorizing in Privacy Research

We posted on SSRN a working paper co-authored by Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, “From Contextualizing to Context-Theorizing: Assessing Context Effects in Privacy Research”.

Robust Analytics Lab
10 Jun 2020

Robustness in Social Media Studies

On Tuesday, February 4, Nan Zhang gave a talk on robustness in social media studies at DAISY 2020, a Workshop on Trans-disciplinary Data Science in the University of Florida. The...

Robust Analytics Lab
05 Feb 2020

Validity Concerns in Using Organic Data

An article co-authored by Heng Xu, Nan Zhang, and Le (Betty) Zhou was recently accepted for publication at the Journal of Management. In the article, we provide an overview of...

Robust Analytics Lab
12 Nov 2019

AMA Best Paper Award

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang recently received a Best Paper Award from the Consumer 360° Track of the 2019 American Marketing Association (AMA) Summer Academic Conference for paper “How Much Choice is Too Much? A Machine Learning Based Meta-Analysis of...

Robust Analytics Lab
12 Aug 2019

SIGMOD Research Highlight Award

Nan Zhang and coauthors (A. Asudeh, J. Augustine, A. Nazi, S. Thirumuruganathan, G. Das and D. Srivastava) recently received a Research Highlight Award from ACM SIGMOD for their paper “Efficient...

Nan Zhang
11 Aug 2019

Postdoc Opening

The Robust Analytics Lab in the Kogod School of Business at the American University in Washington, D.C. is looking for an exceptional candidate to fill a postdoctoral fellow position. The initial term of this position is one year with the...

Robust Analytics Lab
01 Aug 2019

Theore - DARPA Project

We gratefully acknowledge the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) for their support on our project “Theore: Theory-Driven Curation and Reusable Evaluation of Research Claims in social and behavioral studies”.

Robust Analytics Lab
17 Jun 2019

Panel on Methodological Advances for Research Using Organic Data @ SIOP 2019

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang participated as panelists in discussions of the recent methodological developments in research using organic data, a panel at SIOP 2019 organized by Professor Betty Zhou...

Robust Analytics Lab
04 Apr 2019

Presentation on “Privacy Disparity” @ Data & Society

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang visited Data & Society Research Institute in New York City and discussed how various privacy preserving techniques may disproportionately suppress information for minorities or mask...

Robust Analytics Lab
15 Mar 2019

Presentation on “Robust Data Analytics” @ AU Winter Academy Luncheon

Nan Zhang, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab, gave a talk on robust data analytics at the American University’s inaugural Winter Academy Luncheon in Fort Lauderdale, Florida on Friday, March...

Nan Zhang
01 Mar 2019

Kogod Business Briefing: Robust Analytics

Nan Zhang, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab, discussed the importance of ensuring robustness in the data analytics process in Kogod Business Briefing on February 13, 2019.

Nan Zhang
13 Feb 2019

SIGMOD 2019 Paper: Compact Data Representation with Bounded Rank Regret

Selecting the best items in a dataset is a common task in data exploration. However, the concept of “best” lies in the eyes of the beholder - different users may...

Nan Zhang
15 Oct 2018

AU Ed Talk: Data in the everyday

Heng Xu, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab, will deliver one of the four AU Ed Talks in this year’s All American Weekend. Her talk, “Data in the Everyday”, will...

Heng Xu
01 Oct 2018

NSF Project: Robust Twitter Analytics

We gratefully acknowledge the National Science Foundation for their support on our project 1850605, “RR: Establishing and Boosting Confidence Levels for Empirical Research Using Twitter Data”.

Robust Analytics Lab
03 Sep 2018

Package for scheduling web requests with cache and throttling support

As part of our efforts for developing a toolset that enables robust analytics over social media such as Twitter, we published at Github the cached-throttled-req package under GPL-3.0 license. It...

Robust Analytics Lab
16 Aug 2018

National Academies Report on Open Data

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine today released a new report on “Open Science By Design: Realizing a Vision for 21st Century Research”, which introduces a framework of...

Heng Xu
16 Jul 2018

Talk on Reliable Research in Business Workshop

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, Co-directors of Robust Analytics Lab, recently gave a joint talk titled “Open Data + Robust Workflow: Towards Reproducible Empirical Research on Organic Data” in the...

Robust Analytics Lab
10 May 2018

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robustness