FW-HTF-P: Exploring Creative Design at the Human-technology Frontier Through the Emerging Artist-technologist Occupation

鉴于智能机器将越来越多地取代目前由人类执行的日常任务，创造性技能被认为是对未来各个领域的工人最有价值的技能。由于技术的进步，特别是人工智能（AI）和增强现实和虚拟现实（AR/VR），创意设计过程也在发生变化。未来劳动力所需的创造性技能是什么？如何才能最好地发展和培养这些技能？这个项目通过探索人工智能和AR/VR技术的进步如何改变艺术家-技术专家的新兴职业来解决这个问题。作为艺术和技术的专家，他们认为这两个领域之间没有障碍，艺术家技术专家处于一个独特的位置，可以设计出以前难以想象的媒体产品，不仅适用于艺术和娱乐，还适用于许多其他领域，如教育，医疗保健，营销和新产品开发。该项目涉及具有艺术、人工智能、AR/VR、工程、学习科学、教育、商业、创业、职业教育、道德和残疾等相关专业知识的不同研究人员和从业者，旨在探索性研究AR/VR和人工智能的具体应用如何影响艺术家技术人员的创作过程、职业身份、整体工作经验、准备工作以及相关的公平和包容问题。该项目最初的重点是音乐家和作曲家，并将扩展到其他艺术领域。研究的核心是与关键利益相关者进行探索性对话（按照美国国家科学基金会创新队项目推动的客户发现访谈的传统进行），随后是三个工作组得出结论并确定值得进一步研究的问题，以加强未来艺术家-技术人员在人类技术前沿（未来技术焦点）的设计过程。有效地为未来的艺术家技术人员做好准备，以便在他们的工作中充分利用人工智能和AR/VR（未来的工作重点），并分别为代表性不足的人群增加进入这一职业的机会（未来的工作重点）。一系列的团队学习经验和接触点事件为这项合作工作提供了信息，同时也支持项目团队开发所需的跨学科专业知识和战略。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Creative skills have been identified as most valuable for future workers across domains, given the expectation that intelligent machines will increasingly replace routine tasks currently performed by people. The creative design process also is changing due to advances in technology, in particular, artificial intelligence (AI) and augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR). What are the creative skills needed for the future workforce, and how can these be best developed and nurtured? This project addresses this question by exploring how advances in AI and AR/VR technology are changing the emerging occupation of artist-technologist. As experts in both arts and technology who see no barriers between these two fields, artist-technologists are in a unique position to design previously inconceivable media products with relevance and applications not only for the arts and entertainment, but many other fields such as education, health care, marketing and new product development. The project involves a diverse group of researchers and practitioners with relevant expertise in the arts, AI, AR/VR, engineering, learning sciences, education, business, entrepreneurship, career education, ethics, and disability in an exploratory study of how specific applications of AR/VR and AI may affect artist-technologists’ creative process, professional identity, overall work experience, preparation, and related equity and inclusion issues. The initial focus of the project is on musicians and composers, and will expand to other artistic endeavors. At the core of the study are exploratory conversations with key stakeholders (conducted in the tradition of customer discovery interviews promoted by NSF's Innovation Corps program), followed by three task forces drawing implications and identifying issues worthy of further research for enhancing future artist-technologists’ design process at the human-technology frontier (future technology focus), effectively preparing future artist-technologists to make best use of AI and AR/VR in their work (future workers focus), and increasing access to this occupation by underrepresented populations (future work focus), respectively. A series of team learning experiences and touch-point events informs this collaborative work, while also supporting the project team in developing the needed cross-disciplinary expertise and strategies.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.