Presentation title: Who Needs a Statistician Anymore?
Date & time: Friday, June 19 from 12-1 PM (PDT)
Location: Hybrid
- In-person: Room B104, School of Population and Public Health, 2206 East Mall, Vancouver
Lunch provided for in-person attendees. RSVP required (please respond before 10 AM on Tuesday, June 16). If you have any dietary restrictions or food allergies, please email info@spph.ubc.ca. - Online: Zoom. Please register to receive the meeting link.
Register/RSVP: https://ubc.zoom.us/meeting/register/_f1YehdlTpWl9ZWKgh843w
Summary
As AI tools become increasingly capable of generating complex analyses, do research teams still need dedicated statisticians? Through a series of practical, demonstration-based case studies, this session explores the realities of modern AI-assisted data analysis.
We will examine the practice of “vibe coding” and the rise of automated, “agentic” tools that autonomously iterate across a project. By comparing how different AI systems handle analysis requests, we will look past the polished final results to understand the workflows behind them. Ultimately, this presentation should provide public health researchers with a way to demonstrate and discuss AI-generated analyses, sparking a candid conversation about the evolving role of methodological expertise in the AI era.
This is a standalone companion piece to the June 9 CHSPR Seminar on AI in research. Prior attendance at the CHSPR seminar is not required.
About the speaker
M. Ehsan Karim’s research focuses on biostatistics, advanced epidemiological methods, and causal inference, including the evaluation of high-dimensional propensity score and machine learning applications. His recent work addresses the intersection of artificial intelligence and health research.