How Social Workers Use AI to Help Unhoused Teens

 Even when you might not know it, we have all experienced how artificial intelligence can make our lives easier and more fun. 

How Social Workers Use AI to Help Unhoused Teens

Machine learning algorithms are the reason why a horror movie will never cross my Netflix screen. It should scream the office or nothing else. The sneaky algorithms have a way of figuring out what I want even before I know it, that they help me find those products and then those exact products follow me from website to website day and night. I'm totally the moment of weakness. I click the ad and purchase the product But shopping and scrolling are just the tip of the A. I eyes as a social work scholar. I have seen how artificial intelligence can help provide solutions to some of the biggest problems facing our society Problems like homelessness, poverty, addiction.

 For the last seven years, I have been working with computer scientist and technologist to develop algorithms that can help some of the most vulnerable members of our society Young people experiencing homelessness. among the countless issues that they experience, substance use is almost an epidemic among this group of young people. Studies show that almost 15% of all young people experiencing on homelessness use some kind of illicit substance in comparison. In comparison, less than five to 10 percent of young people who do not experience homelessness do the same. statistics can, however, be nothing So let me explain to you why substances use is so pervasive among this group of young people in a manner that perhaps can be more relatable. Imagine you're 18. You have nowhere to stay. You cannot. call your mom or your dad every. that you have to carry on you at all times either in a backpack or a shopping cart. And you have to find a new place to sleep in every night. Take a look at this picture. 

Take it by a 19 year old girl experiencing homelessness right here. in Denver. This is. what it's like sleeping on dirty state mattress. against a coal syndrome. Trash littered everywhere Use condoms and heroin needles on the floor. I would be terrified in a place like this, wouldn't you? You would do anything to escape this reality and number your pain And that's what a lot of these young people do. They often use substances to go with their drama. Do you feel comfortable in an uncomfortable world? No. researchers have tried to tackle this problem for decades using a method that sounds weight on the surface. 

Beer lead groups for six to eight weeks. These young people come together, talk about their problems, get advice and positive support from their beers and work on developing medical peace skills. These groups are relatively inexpensive to operate, which is a big deal for cash trap nonprofits. We're also the ones working them. These groups work. It's because they're designed to be developmentally appropriate Analysts are almost biologically hardwired. The question persist and doubt what adults tell them to do Baron or a teacher? You know what I'm talking about. But let's begin our friends and sometimes also be toxic. I mean, I literally spoke to the none of you once. because my friends told me that you don't get me high and it was the cool thing to do. Any kids out there, including my own. Please do not repeat the same mistakes I did. But you get the point. Let's put a group of young people who might mimic each other's negative behaviors in a group for 6 to 8 weeks I could go wrong. A lot of you might have guessed it. Instead of going down substance use actually increases along with other negative behaviors. A process known as deviancy training in scientific circles. Until recently, researchers didn't have a reliable way of predicting which groups would work and which groups would spiral out of control. Social workers are usually the ones putting these groups together either. Assigning young people to these forms randomly are allowing them to sell selected to those groups Unfortunately, neither scenario is ideal.

 Let's take a look at this graphic from my research to better understand why in case you're wondering, this is a social network map of 160 young people experiencing homelessness in Los Angeles, California, every. dot on this picture is one young person experiencing homelessness and the links between them are shown by the lights The youth, who are very popular and well connected, find themselves at the center of this network and the youth who are not as popular or well connected or pushed and prepared for any of this network. Now notice the red dots on this picture. These are the young people who use math and more importantly, notice how tightly connected they are. You know what that tells me? It tells me if we put these young people in a group together Matt Hughes will probably go up instead of down because they'll just reinforce each other's Matthew's behaviors And also the great dot or ketchup do what everyone else has been doing randomly assigning to them to groups. It's less hard, but no better because it ignores natural social influence. Who are you more likely to listen to? Your friends are some random stranger.

 So I just. I started wondering what if you could use artificial intelligence and machine learning to figure out what's the best way to configure these groups in order to do that, I partnered with researchers from USC Center for Artificial Intelligence and Society. and God permission from a group of young people experiencing homelessness to use their social network data and basic personal information. Then we. felt the machines this data about their social relationships, their substance use behaviors and other relevant behaviors and the machines would run iteratively. Testing 30 to 50 groups at a time finding out the best configuration How did the algorithm do this? The algorithm found a way of mathematically maximizing the number of existing friendships in each group while minimizing the number of substance users Not only that, the algorithm also found a way of accounting for how people's relationships would change in these groups in response to the intervention that positive relationships would develop and deepen and negative relationships would subside and influence over the course of the intervention. you might ask why God did person do this well to start with social services? understaffed and overworked could be extremely time consuming and might happening for person to do all these gas calculations, especially for a large number of people. Second, person would like a machine cannot protect an advance which groups would actually reduce substance use

 The results of the algorithm were astounding compared to randomly allocated groups. These TI generated groups were able to reduce substance use by almost 40 to 70% that right. 40 to 70% That's huge results like these could mean that social workers can use their time and resources more efficiently to help more youth faster. and for the youth themselves, getting you sober can be life changing. staying sober, getting one of their pathways out of homelessness. Now this is just one example of many of how technology can improve social services I'll provide a few others in Allegheny County, social workers are using a predictive analytics algorithm to screen for and triage the most serious child abuse cases Researchers in New York are studying young people's tweets to develop an algorithm to screen for signs of loss, aggression and substance use as a way of reducing youth violence In one of my own studies, I've been using young people's Facebook post to develop an algorithm that could predict their likelihood of developing substance use disorders compared to traditional methods that can predict substance use accurately, maybe 30% of the tie This algorithm can predict substance use almost. 18% of the time. this level of accuracy could mean that social workers are better able to prioritize their cases instead. of expanding their limited time and resources on people who might not need it at that moment, they can instead help people who needed the most And that's the goal. This is not about machines replacing social workers algorithms are not perfect in the wrong hands. They can actually exacerbate bias and system and racism, however. done right, they can be a powerful tool in the hands of social workers to empower them to do what they do best, to use their intuition, their empathy and their experience to help people overcome life's most difficult challenges. And that's. the kind of future I wish to see And I now I hope you do as well. Thank you so much for your time.