Psychology for You!

Why do we treat Alexa or ChatGPT like a helpful coworker – or even a friend? This article explores how talking to conversational AI shapes the beliefs we form about machines.

AI’s decisions are often comprised with a human in the loop. Why? The person tries to improve the decisions but ends up making it worse despite good intentions. Our need to contribute interferes with these systems. In this article, we discuss this issue and whether explainable AI can foster true human-AI teamwork for better choices.

Not long ago, artificial intelligence was mostly found in science fiction and computer science departments. Today, it drafts our emails, recommends our next purchase, tutors our children, and occasionally tells us it understands how we feel. This shift has happened so quickly that our psychological vocabulary is still catching up. What does it mean to trust a system that has no body, no history, and no stake in the outcome but communicates like us? Why do we sometimes treat a chatbot with the same politeness we'd extend to a colleague, and other times discard it the moment it makes a...