Kai Rune Larsen

Kai R. Larsen is a Professor II (part-time) in the Department of Information Systems at the University of Agder. He is also an Associate Professor of Information Systems in the division of Organizational Leadership and Information Analytics, Leeds School of Business, University of Colorado Boulder. He is a courtesy faculty member in the Department of Information Science of the College of Media, Communication and Information, a Research Advisor to Gallup, and a Fellow of the Institute of Behavioral Science. Kai is most known for providing a practical solution to Edward Thorndike's (1904) Jingle Fallacy and for his contributions to the Semantic Theory of Survey Response (STSR), which holds that results of surveys using attitude scales primarily measure the linguistic relationships between survey questions. Kai’s book on Automated Machine Learning is slated for publication by Oxford University Press in 2020.

Kai has published papers in top journals of three disciplines, and his paper with Lee and Kozar is one of the top 10 most downloaded in the Association for Information Systems' electronic library. Kai and his students have developed several award-winning technologies currently in use by thousands of users, including INN and TheoryOn, and he manages the Theories Used in IS Wiki. As Director of the federally supported Human Behavior Project, he is conducting research to create a transdisciplinary "backbone" for theoretical research. Kai’s research uses natural language processing technologies to create an integrating framework for predictors of human behavior. The research has implications for our understanding of many human behaviors, including technology utilization, investor decisions, voter behaviors, and cancer prevention behaviors.