Théophile Demazure: sparking young people’s interest in data

Meet Théophile Demazure, IVADO professor and assistant professor in the Department of Information Technologies at HEC Montréal.

Young people who dislike math still need to understand data. That is the problem Théophile Demazure is working to solve.

Originally trained in human-machine interfaces through flight and motorsport simulators, he now studies the psychological and behavioral effects of AI on the people who work with it, and how to design better tools to support them.

On the educational front, he co-develops Business Builders, a gamified platform that teaches data visualization and decision-making through interactive dashboards.

The Hockey Analyst, launched in April 2026 in partnership with the NHL and SAP, is its most recent expression: by placing students in a decision-making role using real game data, it turns passion for the sport into a driver of analytical learning.

The goal is to reach young people where they are, including those left cold by traditional business contexts.

This concern for design goes beyond pedagogy. His research on the visualization of AI decisions shows that an excess of visual information can produce the opposite of the intended effect: too much detail on an AI decision does not clarify things for the user, it overwhelms them.

What he calls morphological clarity, the level of detail provided when presenting an algorithmic decision, is a delicate balance between precision and readability. The end user’s criterion is not the scientific rigor of the representation, but their ability to act on it.

His recent work has also led him to observe how AI reshapes team dynamics in creative settings.

By standardizing the presentation of ideas submitted by different collaborators, it can reduce hierarchical bias: proposals are evaluated on their merits, regardless of who put them forward.

He also notes that AI demands continuous adaptation, and that settling into a routine that works often means missing a better option just around the corner.

That conviction developed gradually. After his work with simulators, he turned his attention to everyday work environments, where the concerns surrounding technology, among both employers and employees, pointed to a need for research that was useful and grounded in reality.

Assistant professor in the Department of Information Technologies at HEC Montréal and a member of the ERPsim Laboratory, he collaborates with organizations seeking to study AI adoption in their workplaces through a scientific lens.