Hi!

I am Ananya Bhattacharjee, a Postdoctoral Fellow at the King Center on Global Development at Stanford University, where I work with Professors Emma Brunskill and Diyi Yang. I completed my PhD in Computer Science at the University of Toronto. I study, design, and build interactive, AI-driven interventions that can dynamically adapt to the individual and social contexts of users. These interventions broadly aim to promote psychosocial wellbeing. Drawing on insights from surveys, interviews, and field experiments, I design interventions that employ generative AI and reinforcement learning to adaptively support users' evolving needs and contexts. The interventions I deploy can take many forms, including web platforms that simulate peer support and provide generative, multimodal experiences, mobile applications that promote reflection or assist in managing stress, and text messaging programs that alleviate symptoms of depression and anxiety.

I also spent time at Microsoft Research during Summer 2024, where I contributed to incorporating personality traits into Copilot. I am originally from Bangladesh and completed my bachelor's degree at Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET).

Highlights & Impact:

• I have published papers in venues such as CHI, Nature Human Behaviour, CSCW, DIS, TOCHI, FAccT, AAAI HCOMP, and JMIR. My work has received a Best Paper Award (CHI) and three Honorable Mentions (CHI×2, CSCW×1). 

• I contributed to the development of the Small Steps SMS program — a two-month intervention to help people manage anxiety and depression symptoms — which has reached over 5,000 users in North America. Shortened versions and modular components of the intervention have been deployed to another 5,000 users. This collaboration involved the University of Toronto, Northwestern University, Microsoft Research, and Mental Health America.

• I designed and launched several large-scale online interventions that have supported over 2,000 students in the Greater Toronto area in achieving academic goals and improving psychological wellbeing.

• My research on personalizing the communication traits of conversational agents has been directly applied by Microsoft AI to incorporate personality traits into Copilot.  Additionally, this work has influenced the user interaction features in other Microsoft products, including Xbox.

• My research on digital support interactions has driven policy changes at two major helplines: Partnership to End Addiction in the USA and Kaan Pete Roi in Bangladesh.

Recent News

• May 2026: NIH/NIDA R61/R33 project on AI-enhanced peer-led family support for families of individuals with substance use disorder has been funded; I will serve as Consultant Co-Investigator.

• February 2026: Our single session intervention megastudy is published in Nature Human Behaviour

• October 2025: Two-month study on what disrupts engagement with digital mental health tools received a CSCW Honorable Mention Award.

• September 2025: Started my postdoc in Stanford with Emma Brunskill and Diyi Yang.

• April 2025: New paper on personalizing narratives using LLMs to communicate psychology principles accepted at DIS 2025. 

• February 2025: New paper on the role of social contexts in engagement with digital mental health tools is accepted in CSCW 2025. Very excited about this work being accepted as it lays out actionable steps for digital mental health researchers in the coming years!