Hi Da Research Lab | Human Insight for Data & AI

About Us

Hi Da Lab is a network of researchers from various academic disciplines who work on interdisciplinary projects. Our mission is to address challenges in today’s information ecosystem where humans and technology intersect. We tackle real-world problems across diverse contexts using novel data sources and innovative techniques.

Hi Da Lab aims to inspire and support researchers and students from different backgrounds to collaborate and complete innovative projects. Our current focus includes the challenges and opportunities of AI, health and social media, misinformation, and the societal impacts of research.

If you are interested in joining our team, send us an email.

Hi Da Lab Team

Research Areas

Health Informatics

Exploring how data and technology can improve health outcomes, digital health communication, and access to reliable information.

Science of Science

Analyzing scientific production, networks, and impact to understand how science evolves and influences society.

Applied AI

Building and evaluating AI systems that are practical, ethical, and human-centered with applications in education, health, and governance.

Social Media Analytics

Mining and modeling digital conversations to uncover patterns, the spread of information, public opinion, and online behaviors.

Latest News

WIS News 10 spotlighted our work at USC’s Social Media Insights Lab on College Sports Social Pulse™, a weekly analytics-driven ranking of the teams, players, and coaches dominating the online conversation.
The Hi Da Lab team received an external grant from IMLS.

Read more

Our team received a grant of $192,843 from Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Program to support Flare AI (Future Literacy and AI Readiness in Education), a three-year national initiative led by USC to strengthen AI literacy through school libraries. The project will develop a free, open-access AI literacy curriculum and ready-to-implement materials for secondary school librarians—co-designed with librarians nationwide and focused on durable AI literacy principles so the resources remain relevant as AI evolves.
The website for FLARE AI Future Literacy and AI Readiness in Education is launched.
Hi Da team received a grant from NNLM.

Read more

Our team has received an NNLM grant for Battle for Better Health, an initiative using health literacy and AI literacy to address obesity in South Carolina. The project will help adults strengthen their ability to evaluate AI-generated health information, identify misinformation, and use trusted resources like MedlinePlus through interactive workshops, printed toolkits, and short educational videos delivered in partnership with local libraries and medical clinics—prioritizing medically underserved communities to help reduce health disparities.
New work from our team quantifying gender, racial, and intersectional bias in Google Cloud Vision AI using a large image set has been published in AI and Ethics.
Our study analyzing two years of COVID-19 social media content to identify what motivates and demotivates vaccination has been published in the Natural Language Processing Journal.
Findings from our project on how generative AI is reshaping academic practices across twenty countries have been accepted for publication in Information Processing & Management.
Our team’s new study, published in AI and Ethics, reveals significant gender and racial biases in how Google Vision AI identifies scientists.
Samaneh Borji received the 2024–2026 Institute for Information Literacy at Purdue research grant.
Valerie Vera received the Eugene Garfield Dissertation Fellowship.
Conducting a large-scale survey across 20 countries to explore the use, benefits, barriers, and trust associated with generative AI.
Analysis of 600K tweets about COVID-19 using framing theory identified frames that reflect public opinions in a health crisis. Published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research.
In collaboration with the Office of the Vice President for Research at UofSC, we are evaluating the impact of NSF’s EPSCoR and NIH’s IDeA programs.
Paper accepted in the National Communication Association Annual Convention (Public Relations Division).
Keynote at Altmetrics 20 on science and society in the age of disinformation.
Received a $25,000 grant from UofSC to study COVID-19 misinformation on YouTube.
Paper accepted in the Journal of Information Science.