Are computers scapegoats? Attributions of responsibility in human–computer interaction

✍ Scribed by YOUNGME MOON; CLIFFORD NASS

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 1998
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 313 KB
• Volume: 49
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1071-5819
• DOI: 10.1006/ijhc.1998.0199

✦ Synopsis

This study investigated how people make attributions of responsibility when interacting with computers. In particular, two questions were addressed: under what circumstances will users blame computers for failed outcomes? And under what circumstances will users credit computers for successful outcomes? The first prediction was that similarity between a user's personality and a computer's personality would reduce the tendency for users to exhibit a ''self-serving bias'' in assigning responsibility for outcomes in human-computer interaction. The second prediction was that greater user control would lead to more internal attributions, regardless of outcome. A 2;2;2 balanced, betweensubjects experiment (N"80) was conducted. Results strongly supported the predictions: when the outcome was negative, participants working with a similar computer were less likely to blame the computer and more likely to blame themselves, compared with participants working with a dissimilar computer. When the outcome was positive, participants working with a similar computer were more likely to credit the computer and less likely to take the credit themselves, compared with participants working with a dissimilar computer. In addition, when users were given more control over outcomes, they tended to make more internal attributions, regardless of whether the outcome was positive or negative.