Scientific Director, Youth Safety & Wellbeing

The Center for Behavioral Science and AI (CBSAI) is a new APA entity built to shape how AI systems affect the people who use them, starting with its first priority area, Youth Safety & Wellbeing. The Scientific Director is the person who carries scientific authority for this priority area, chairs and manages the Youth Safety & Wellbeing Scientific Advisory Group, and ensures the Center's Specifications and Public Guidance workstreams are grounded in rigorous, defensible science.

The Scientific Director must have demonstrated experience guiding and organizing groups composed of senior academic and clinical experts and engaging them in substantive scientific discussion. The Director must also be able to provide independent scientific leadership in conversations with AI industry partners, funders, and other stakeholders. The role requires deep subject-matter expertise, an appreciation for the breadth of psychological science relevant to youth safety and well-being, and the judgment to make sound, timely decisions in a rapidly changing technological environment whose implications for young people continue to evolve.

Technology companies have long recognized the importance of understanding how human behavior intersects with AI systems, platforms, and applications. With AI rapidly penetrating all aspects of individuals' lives and society as a whole, the technology presents both extraordinary promise and significant risks.

The CBSAI seeks to fundamentally broaden the role of psychological science in AI's layered ecosystem — spanning software, hardware, language models, data tools, and the interfaces used to build, train, deploy, and manage AI applications. The Center is how APA's institutional capacity becomes operational for the AI industry: a permanent infrastructure for translating the broad body of behavioral science into the products that now mediate how billions of people think, feel, learn, work, and relate to one another.

APA believes AI's scaffolding should enable humans to thrive, adapt, and grow across all dimensions of life. The Center will sit at the nexus of human behavior, technology, and well-being — bridging academic research and real-world impact by bringing sound science to AI and technology companies through research, advocacy, education, and national and international collaboration.

The Center is in its start-up phase and is building its founding team, beginning with the scientific leadership for its first priority area, Youth Safety & Wellbeing.

• →Chair and manage the Youth Safety & Wellbeing Scientific Advisory: set agendas, recruit and steward members, and run the body as a genuine peer-level scientific forum rather than an advisory formality.
• →Serve as CBSAI's credible scientific face for this priority area — recognized by, and able to recruit from, the researchers the field already looks to.
• →Maintain a broad, current personal network across academia, clinical practice, and industry research on youth development, media, and technology — know who is doing rigorous work and who else to call.

• Own the Specifications workstream for Youth Safety & Wellbeing: translating behavioral science into useable specifications for engineering and product teams.
• Translate scientific evidence into specific, engineer-ready product and design requirements, in partnership with Center staff.
• Set the scientific bar for when available evidence supports action, balancing rigor with the need to respond to emerging challenges in a rapidly evolving field. Comfortable making evidence-informed recommendations without waiting for definitive academic consensus, while maintaining a transparent and defensible scientific rationale.

• Serve as scientific reviewer and sign-off authority for Public Guidance deliverables (practitioner guides, public education materials, policy recommendations) prior to release, ensuring accuracy and rigor.
• Partner with Center staff on cross-workstream questions where a Topic produces deliverables in both workstreams.

• Hold the line on scientific conclusions and methodology against commercial, reputational, and/or funder pressure, consistent with CBSAI's firewall commitments (AI-company partners may weigh in on relevance and factual accuracy — never on findings or conclusions).
• Flag independence or firewall concerns to the Executive Director

• Represent CBSAI's science externally at major convenings, funder and industry conversations, and public forums (e.g., high-profile global and industry gatherings).
• Build and sustain the relationships that keep CBSAI credible with the scientific field, AI companies, and funders simultaneously.

• Directly supervise the Product Lead and help define how the Specifications workstream team grows.
• Serve as the working model for how future priority-area Scientific Leads are hired and structured as CBSAI adds priority areas.

• Some domestic and international travel to represent CBSAI at major scientific, policy, and industry convenings, Scientific Advisory meetings, and academic conferences.

Other Duties as Assigned    

The American Psychological Association (APA) represents 146,000 psychologists, students, and affiliates, primarily in the U.S. and Canada but also in other countries around the world. APA is a scientific and professional organization with about 500 employees and is categorized as a 501(c)(3) along with its 501(c)(6) companion organization, APA Services, Inc.

APA offers a generous employee benefits program, including Remote Work/Flexible Scheduling; a 401(k) option with employer match of up to 4%; medical, dental, and vision insurance options and an outpatient mental health benefit; paid personal/vacation time plus 12 paid holidays; Family/Medical Leave; tuition assistance; an Employee Assistance Program (EAP); short- and long-term disability insurance; and more. 

Qualified candidates must apply online through APA’s applicant system and attach a resume and cover letter specifying your salary expectations. Applications that are submitted without both documents are considered incomplete and will not be reviewed for consideration. Once your application is submitted, you will receive a confirmation email. Please make sure to check your Spam folder if you do not receive an email from us.

The American Psychological Association is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, personal appearance, familial status, family responsibilities, matriculation, political affiliation, genetic information, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected under applicable federal, state, or local law. #LIremote