Tobias Thejll-Madsen is a teacher, experimental psychologist, and researcher closely associated with the development and delivery of the MA(hons) Interdisciplinary Futures programme at Edinburgh Futures Institute. Prior to this role, he completed his PhD with the UKRI Centre for Doctoral Training in Socially Intelligent Artificial Agents at the University of Glasgow in 2025. Here his research focused on theoretical and methodological challenges in affective computing – an interdisciplinary area that seeks to equip computers with the ability to recognise, model, and respond to human emotion. His work seeks to develop rigorous testing paradigms built on strong theoretical foundations from psychology to ensure that claims about the abilities of different artificial intelligence tools are accurate and methodologically grounded.
Outside of his work with AI, Tobias has a keen interest in education research and in developing educational resources. Together with Dr Gavin McCabe, he authored the Reflection Toolkit and the Curriculum Toolkit for Embedding Student Development, Employability and Careers. Further, as a part of a number of research assistant positions held with the University throughout his PhD, Tobias has worked on improving feedback processes, looked at students’ use of lecture recordings, and designed and helped write Edinburgh Global’s Transitions and Mentoring Toolkit.
