Tuesday, November 11, 2025
12:10pm-1:30pm
MC 331
5 King's College Road
Speaker: Dr. Jonathan Rose
Professor, University of Toronto, Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Location: MC331 (Mechanical Engineering Building, 5 King’s College Road, Room 331)
Title: A Fully Generative Motivational Interviewing Counsellor Chatbot for Moving Smokers Towards the Decision to Quit
To help us plan, please register at the below link:
PsychEng Seminar Registration: 2025 Nov 11, Dr. Jonathan Rose
Abstract:
In a collaboration between engineers and clinician researchers, we* have been working on chatbots to help in smoking cessation for over 7 years. Earlier attempts used classical Natural Language Processing software techniques together with scripted text as that was the only thing available. Technology has run past our work with the advent of powerful Large Language Models. This talk will present our first attempt to catch up to the native LLM capability to engage in a talk-therapeutic conversation based on the widely used Motivational Interviewing approach. Here we use a ‘single prompt’ approach, but describe a bona fide attempt to carefully evolve that prompt. We will then show a second attempt to exert control over the quality and nature of the conversation, without losing the native conversational ability. Here we two important concepts now extant in the world of LLMs: 1) decomposing the task into two separate ‘agents’ that can focus on separate aspects of the conversation and 2) Providing the one of those agents with a carefully curated ‘guided chain-of-thought.’ The latter is possibly an important way to exert control/enforce expertise upon an LLM. In all cases we will show results of testing the chatbots on human smokers, giving the apparent effect one week after the conversation, and the perception of empathy by the client smokers.
*This talk describes the work of many students, faculty and researchers at the University of Toronto in Engineering, the iSchool, and clinician-researchers at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto.
Biography:
Jonathan Rose is a Professor in the Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Toronto, and an Affiliate Scientist with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto.
His previous research focused on the architecture and design software for Field-Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs). He was co-founder and President of Right Track CAD Corporation, formed in 1998, which developed architecture and software of FPGAs to device vendors. Right Track was acquired by Altera Corporation in 2000.
His current research focuses on the use of software and natural language processing in the measurement, diagnosis, and therapy of mental health. His research also seeks to gain an understanding of how Large Language Models do what they do.
He served as Chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering from January 2004 through June 2009, and as the Director of the Engineering Business Minor from 2010-2017. He currently serves as the Chair of the Advisory Board of the Engineering Entrepreneurship Hatchery. He was a member of the Board of Directors for Academics without Borders from 2011 to 2022 and is now Director Emeritus.
He is a Member of the Order of Canada, a Fellow of the IEEE, the ACM, the Canadian Academy of Engineering, a Foreign Member of the American National Academy of Engineering, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. He is a Senior Fellow of Massey College in the University of Toronto and served on the Governing Board of the College from 2010-2021, and is serving as the Acting Principal in the 2024 year.
To help us plan, please register at the below link:
PsychEng Seminar Registration: 2025 Nov 11, Dr. Jonathan Rose