A recent study has highlighted a significant shift in public opinion, revealing that people increasingly prefer Artificial Intelligence (AI) over human judgment for making redistributive decisions. As AI integrates deeper into both public and private sectors, understanding how it is perceived by the public, ensuring satisfaction with its outcomes, and maintaining transparency and accountability are crucial for its acceptance and effectiveness.
The study, conducted by researchers from the University of Portsmouth and the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition, explored public attitudes towards algorithmic versus human decision-making. Researchers assessed the impact of perceived discrimination on these preferences through an online experiment where participants chose between a human and an AI to decide the redistribution of earnings after completing a series of tasks. Surprisingly, over 60% of the over 200 UK and German participants favoured AI over humans for these decisions, challenging the traditional belief that humans are preferred for decisions involving moral considerations such as fairness.
Despite this preference for AI, the participants expressed less satisfaction with the AI’s decisions, perceiving them as less fair than those made by humans. The study suggests that personal material interests and individual fairness ideals heavily influence subjective assessments of decisions. While minor deviations from their ideals were tolerable, participants reacted strongly and negatively to decisions that deviated significantly from established fairness principles.
Dr Wolfgang Luhan, Associate Professor of Behavioural Economics at the University of Portsmouth and lead author of the study, noted the importance of the AI’s performance and its ability to explain its decision-making processes in gaining public trust, especially in contexts that involve moral decisions. He emphasized transparency and accountability in algorithmic decision-making as crucial for broader acceptance.
The research also touched on the broader application of AI in various sectors, such as hiring, compensation planning, policing, and parole strategies by corporations and public bodies. The findings suggest that with improvements in the consistency of algorithms, public support for AI decision-makers could further increase, even in morally significant areas.
Dr Luhan concluded that adopting the right AI strategies could significantly improve the acceptance of various policies and managerial decisions, such as pay rises or bonus payments, underscoring the potential of AI to enhance decision-making processes across multiple domains.
More information: Marina Chugunova et al, Ruled by robots: preference for algorithmic decision makers and perceptions of their choices, Public Choice. DOI: 10.1007/s11127-024-01178-w
Journal information: Public Choice Provided by University of Portsmouth