The International Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) Conference on Web and Social Media (ICWSM) has named Assistant Professor of Library and Information Science  Kiran Garimella the recipient of the 2024 Adamic-Glance Distinguished Young Researcher Award. Garimella received the award at the 18th AAAI ICWSM Conference held June 3-6, 2024, in Buffalo, New York.

This prestigious award, given to only one researcher in the ICWSM community, “is presented to a young researcher who has distinguished themself through innovative research in the area of computational social science in the early stage of their independent research career,” according to the ICWSM.

Library and Information Science Chair and Associate Professor Rebecca Reynolds said, “This award for Prof. Garimella is truly prestigious, a field-wide recognition, and well-deserved as an ongoing testament to his research excellence and impact for both scholarly research and practical development of new standards for fair technology development practice.” 

Associate Professor of Library and Information Science Vivek Singh said, “What a wonderful recognition of Kiran’s contributions to the field of social computing. This award is one of the most prestigious recognitions for early career researchers in the field of social computing.”

Explaining the purpose and context of the award, ICWSM wrote, “The ICWSM research community at large has greatly impacted this field, through identifying the connections between online digital behaviors and critical societal questions and issues. From misinformation and fake news to how we can use social media and social networks to gain insight into political polarization, mental health, and social movements, the range of topics addressed by the community is continuously expanding. We want to recognize and celebrate the young researchers who are making these contributions today. The award was established in 2021, at the 15th anniversary mark of the AAAI ICWSM conference.”

“I am really excited about this award and for the recognition that the ICWSM community has provided me,” Garimella said. “ICWSM has been my home conference for almost a decade now and I really feel honored that the community respects and recognizes my work. I look forward to contributing to the community."

This is the second significant award Garimella has received from the ICWSM. In 2021, the ICWSM awarded Garimella the Best Paper Award for “Political Polarization in Online News Consumption.”

Next year, Garimella will deliver an invited keynote at the annual ICWSM conference which will be held in Copenhagen.

The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) “is the premier scientific society dedicated to advancing the scientific understanding of the mechanisms underlying thought and intelligent behavior and their embodiment in machines.” 

The International AAAI Conference on Web and Social Media (ICWSM) “is a forum for researchers from multiple disciplines to come together to share knowledge, discuss ideas, exchange information, and learn about cutting-edge research in diverse fields with the common theme of online social media. This overall theme includes research in new perspectives in social theories, as well as computational algorithms for analyzing social media. ICWSM is a singularly fitting venue for research that blends social science and computational approaches to answer important and challenging questions about human social behavior through social media while advancing computational tools for vast and unstructured data.”

Learn more about the Library and Information Science Department at the Rutgers School of Communication and Information on the website.