Pega released a new report that looked at consumer attitudes towards artificial intelligence indicates that, despite the fact that AI technologies are growing, consumers are lacking an understanding of how they benefit from AI. They are more likely to trust a real person to help them make decisions.
“Our study found that only 25% of consumers would trust a decision made by an AI system over that of a person regarding their qualification for a bank loan,” said Dr. Rob Walker, vice president, decisioning and analytics at Pega. “Consumers likely prefer speaking to people because they have a greater degree of trust in them and believe it’s possible to influence the decision, when that’s far from the case. What’s needed is the ability for AI systems to help companies make ethical decisions. To use the same example, in addition to a bank following regulatory processes before making an offer of a loan to an individual it should also be able to determine whether or not it’s the right thing to do ethically.”
Because of this, Pega announced the launch of the Customer Empathy Advisor, which is an AI tool that seeks to incorporate empathy and ethical-decision making in the framework of AI technologies.
The trust issues with AI are pretty serious, as 40% of respondents agreed that AI has the potential to improve the customer service of businesses they interact with. 30% felt comfortable with businesses using AI to interact with them. 9% said they were “very comfortable” with the idea.
There is some cynicism in regards to the businesses they do business with. 68% of respondents say that organizations have an obligation to do what is morally right for the customer, beyond what is legally required. Despite this, 65% of respondents don’t trust that company are looking out for customers interests.
54% of respondents said it’s possible for AI to show bias in the way to make decisions. But I suppose this could help with human assistance as well.
70% of respondents prefer speaking to a human over an AI system or chatbot when deal with with customer services. 69% of respondents agree that they would be more inclined to tell the truth to a human than to an AI system.