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Sharing responsibility with a machine

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  • Kirchkamp, Oliver
  • Strobel, Christina

Abstract

Humans make decisions jointly with others. They share responsibility for the outcome with their interaction partners. Today, more and more often the partner in a decision is not another human but, instead, a machine. Here we ask whether the type of the partner, machine or human, affects our responsibility, our perception of the choice and the choice itself. As a workhorse we use a modified dictator game with two joint decision makers: either two humans or one human and one machine. We find no treatment effect on perceived responsibility or guilt. We also find only a small and insignificant effect on actual choices.

Suggested Citation

  • Kirchkamp, Oliver & Strobel, Christina, 2019. "Sharing responsibility with a machine," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 25-33.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:80:y:2019:i:c:p:25-33
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2019.02.010
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    Cited by:

    1. Brice Corgnet, 2023. "An Experimental Test of Algorithmic Dismissals," Working Papers 2302, Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon St-Étienne (GATE Lyon St-Étienne), Université de Lyon.
    2. Nils Köbis & Jean-François Bonnefon & Iyad Rahwan, 2021. "Bad machines corrupt good morals," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 5(6), pages 679-685, June.
    3. Chugunova, Marina & Sele, Daniela, 2022. "We and It: An interdisciplinary review of the experimental evidence on how humans interact with machines," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 99(C).
    4. Mathieu Chevrier & Vincent Teixeira, 2024. "Algorithm Delegation and Responsibility: Shifting Blame to the Programmer?," GREDEG Working Papers 2024-04, Groupe de REcherche en Droit, Economie, Gestion (GREDEG CNRS), Université Côte d'Azur, France, revised Sep 2024.
    5. Florian Engl, 2022. "A Theory of Causal Responsibility Attribution," CESifo Working Paper Series 9898, CESifo.
    6. Till Feier & Jan Gogoll & Matthias Uhl, 2021. "Hiding Behind Machines: When Blame Is Shifted to Artificial Agents," Papers 2101.11465, arXiv.org.
    7. Christoph March, 2019. "The Behavioral Economics of Artificial Intelligence: Lessons from Experiments with Computer Players," CESifo Working Paper Series 7926, CESifo.
    8. Anna Trunk & Hendrik Birkel & Evi Hartmann, 2020. "On the current state of combining human and artificial intelligence for strategic organizational decision making," Business Research, Springer;German Academic Association for Business Research, vol. 13(3), pages 875-919, November.
    9. March, Christoph, 2021. "Strategic interactions between humans and artificial intelligence: Lessons from experiments with computer players," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Human-computer interaction; Experiment; Shared responsibility; Moral wiggle room;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General

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