Human-Computer Interaction and Human-Centered AI

Dear Colleagues,

As artificial intelligence continues to transform how individuals work, learn, communicate, and receive services, it is essential to design AI systems that genuinely support human needs. Human-centered AI (HCAI) represents a paradigm in which AI must remain transparent, accountable, fair, and aligned with human goals. Instead of expecting people to adapt to AI systems, HCAI calls for designing systems that adapt to human cognition, limitations, values, social contexts, and lived experiences.

This Special Issue will focus on the intersection of HCI and AI, emphasizing how humans perceive, understand, trust, and interact with intelligent systems. Key challenges include the following:

• Enabling meaningful human oversight;
• Building trust without overreliance;
• Creating transparent and explainable interaction mechanisms;
• Addressing bias, fairness, and inclusivity;
• Designing adaptive AI interfaces that support diverse users;
• Ensuring that AI-driven systems enhance rather than undermine human autonomy.

We invite diverse contributions that examine the behavioral, psychological, ethical, social, and technological foundations of human-centered AI. Submissions may include conceptual analyses, empirical studies, design frameworks, methodological innovations, system prototypes, policy perspectives, or review papers (systematic, narrative, or scoping).

Topics of Interest

We seek contributions in areas including, but not limited to, the following:

A. Human-Centered AI Foundations:

• Principles and frameworks for designing human-centered AI;
• AI explainability, interpretability, and transparency in interaction;
• Mental models of AI decision-making;
• Trust calibration and user perceptions of uncertainty.

B. Ethics, Society, and Responsible AI:

• Fairness, accountability, transparency, and ethics (FATE);
• Bias mitigation in interactive AI systems;
• Societal implications of AI in high-stakes domains;
• Human oversight, accountability, and value-sensitive design.

C. Human–AI Collaboration and Interaction:

• Interaction models for mixed-initiative systems;
• User feedback loops, interactive machine learning, co-adaptive AI;
• Collaborative decision-making in professional and operational contexts;
• Behavioral and emotional responses to AI behavior.

D. Adaptive and Personalized AI:

• Personalized algorithms and adaptive user interfaces;
• Cognitive load-aware and emotion-aware AI;
• Multilingual, cross-cultural, and inclusive interaction design.

E. Evaluation and Methodology:

• Methods and metrics for evaluating human–AI interaction;
• User studies, longitudinal evaluations, and trust calibrations;
• Hybrid methodological approaches (HCI + AI + psychology).

F. Applications of Human-Centered AI:

• Education, healthcare, transportation, and public administration;
• Accessibility-oriented applications;
• AI for creative and collaborative work;
• Social robots and conversational agents.

Prof. Dr. Tihomir Orehovački
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. AI is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• human-centered AI
• human–computer interaction
• explainable AI
• responsible AI
• trust in AI
• mental models
• adaptive systems
• user experience
• fairness and ethics
• human–AI collaboration
• interaction design
• cognitive models
• value-sensitive design
• behavioral responses to AI