Workshop #2: Using Generative AI for Qualitative Research in the Montreal Joint PhD Program

When: Thursday, March 12, 2026 — 14:00–15:30
Room: C.412 — Mallette
Workshop facilitator(s): Anand Bhardwaj, Joel Perez-Torrents, Prof. Meaghan Girard, Prof. Celia Chui
Language of the workshop: English
Maximum capacity: 15

Description

Generative AI tools are increasingly used for research tasks such as literature sensemaking, interview guide iteration, memoing, coding support, and drafting. At the same time, institutional guidance and data-governance expectations remain uneven across contexts, and widely used platforms differ materially in how prompts and files may be retained, reviewed, or used for product improvement, creating practical constraints for work with sensitive qualitative materials (Kulkarni et al., 2024). These tools also open meaningful possibilities for engaging large corpora of text and other qualitative materials without requiring deep technical expertise, particularly in early-stage exploration and iterative sensemaking under uncertainty (Faraj, Renno, & Bhardwaj, 2022; Kulkarni et al., 2024). Because qualitative claims increasingly involve “knowing-with” LLMs, responsible use requires new dialogic vetting practices that make the human–AI interaction auditable, reflexive, and methodologically defensible across the research lifecycle (Faraj, Perez-Torrents, Mantere, & Bhardwaj, 2026). This workshop is designed for learning-by-doing: participants will engage in the guided use of generative AI tools to progress their own research projects. The goal is for each attendee to leave with a practical sense of what can be accomplished in partnership with generative AI, and a policy-aligned AI use plan and an initial set of rigor- and ethics-preserving workflows.