In one of the buildings of the National Research Center for Natural Sciences “Demokritos”, caregivers of people with autism and mental illnesses are introduced to the secrets of training artificial intelligence systems so that they, in turn, can pass them on to the people they support. Carers and beneficiaries are taking part in a ground-breaking scheme which aims to give disabled people a career path in a rapidly growing sector.

The innovative project “Disabled Pioneers in Artificial Intelligence” is implemented by the non-profit organization “Science for You” (SciFY) in collaboration with organizations supporting people with disabilities. The project is about training people with disabilities so that they can work in the field of training artificial intelligence systems.

A key step in the development of artificial intelligence systems is their training, and one of the most common ways is supervised learning, where a human helps a system learn to handle and categorize data. This task is called annotation and requires us to characterize the data by putting a label on it. With the “explosion” of artificial intelligence there is an ever-increasing need for human note-takers. In some cases it’s a remote job that’s lonely, repetitive and quite attentive, and the SciFY team thought it might appeal to people with some form of disability.

“Essentially what we’re trying to do is see if it’s possible to leverage people with noticing disabilities, and in what kinds of noticing, versus neurotypical people. What we are considering also has a groundbreaking pilot dimension. If these people can really perform in such tasks, it opens up a job opportunity, which from what it seems will be increasing”, Giorgos Giannakopoulos, researcher of Dimocritos and co-founder of SciFY, explains to APE-MBE.

As he clarifies, “the range of people with disabilities is huge and here we have specific subsets. We started with some exploratory collaborations and even if we see that it is difficult to employ them in this matter, it does not block our way, on the contrary, it builds an infrastructure for us to take the next step in the future”.

Another important aspect of this program is the representation of people with disabilities in artificial intelligence in order to remove the bias of the systems. “This work of including the flaggers of specific underrepresented groups helps combat AI bias. If our flaggers are neurotypicals, then people with disabilities have no voice in the systems that will serve them. So for us it is very important that this also changes and that people with disabilities have a voice in the systems, in research and in society more broadly”, points out Giorgos Giannakopoulos.

The three phases of the program

The project “Disabled Pioneers in Artificial Intelligence” includes three phases, the training of the caregivers of the disabled on the subject of the marking, the training of the disabled themselves by their carers again on this subject and finally, the implementation of a marking project in real conditions in collaboration with the EKEFE Dimokritos.

In the first phase that has already been completed, professionals from the “Child and Adolescent Center”, “Early Intervention” and the “Hellenic Association for Psychosocial Rehabilitation and Vocational Reintegration” (PEPSAEE) were informed during meetings about the marking process.

From an introduction to artificial intelligence to implementing a hypothetical systems training project for clients, SciFY trainers introduced caregivers to the world of notation based on real-world needs that arise in Democritus.

“We need to see which subset of annotation would suit specific groups with specific characteristics,” explains educator, researcher and SciFY member Aris Kosmopoulos.

In one of the actions that the caregivers were asked to implement as an example was to choose between two texts for some vocabulary items with the criterion of which of the two descriptions was better understood. The instructions were clear: judge based on their own way of thinking and then answer whether the text they chose contained simpler words or sentences than the other. Learning from many such examples, the AI ​​system will then reproduce the best understood text. This process of notation was also done for audio files and for images.

Important was the exchange of views during the training of carers about the opportunities that open up for people with autism and mental illness in this area, but also how the process can be better structured to be more understandable to them.

Giorgos Raftis, a caregiver at AMKE “Early Intervention” which supports people on the whole spectrum of autism in their independent living, explains to APE-MPE that “people on the spectrum of autism do not have opportunities for professional rehabilitation, either because they lack skills or because there was no inclusion of them in Greece”. The agency’s decision to participate in the program was “because we want to see how artificial intelligence can be beneficial for people on the autism spectrum and whether they can eventually work in fields of artificial intelligence. The spectrum is very wide, each beneficiary has different needs and abilities, but ultimately it all has to do with inclusion, which in Greece is at an early stage. We want as many beneficiaries as possible to have open doors in the labor market.”

A little earlier, Mr. Raftis gave the trainers practical concerns about the extent of the texts that the beneficiaries could read, urging them to emphasize audio files and images. He also explained about the topic that “they will find much more interesting topics about professions, music, movies, cooking and everything else that concerns their daily life.” “We’ll see if we can change some tasks to make them easier. Also, we need to see what they find interesting in the pilot application of the program and what not”, commented the instructor, Aris Kosmopoulos.

Katerina Karava and Varvara Panteleou, employment counselors at PEPSAE, which specializes in mental illnesses, speak of an “innovative program both for the beneficiaries and for us.” “Artificial intelligence has permeated our way of life, which is why we chose to be involved in this program. We see perspective”, says Ms. Karava. “As the program is a pilot, we will also investigate which beneficiaries can get involved”, emphasizes Ms. Panteleou.

“In addition to offering a service, there is also an ethical part that has to do with the quality of life of people with disabilities in Greece and how you, as a company that hires a marker on the autism spectrum, give him the opportunity to improve the quality his life, his self-confidence, you give him a positive social role and this is very important for his good mental health”, observes Polyxeni Kourasti, from the Child and Adolescent Center, which deals with the provision of mental health services mainly to people with autism.

SciFY’s ultimate goal is to create a social cooperative enterprise of disabled flaggers who will provide this service, with the participation of their support agencies. “It is very important to create an ethical structure that will support them and advise them on their labor rights. It is noted that the labor rights of the notary have not been institutionalized at the international level and there are many issues that researchers have identified. In practice, therefore, we want these people to have a way out of work on terms that are friendly to them and with the possibility of decent and sustainable remuneration”, emphasizes Giorgos Giannakopoulos.

It is noted that the program is implemented with the support of the Ioannis S. Latsis Foundation and the MYTILINEOS company.