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submitted 3 weeks ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/30013197

Significance

As AI tools become increasingly prevalent in workplaces, understanding the social dynamics of AI adoption is crucial. Through four experiments with over 4,400 participants, we reveal a social penalty for AI use: Individuals who use AI tools face negative judgments about their competence and motivation from others. These judgments manifest as both anticipated and actual social penalties, creating a paradox where productivity-enhancing AI tools can simultaneously improve performance and damage one’s professional reputation. Our findings identify a potential barrier to AI adoption and highlight how social perceptions may reduce the acceptance of helpful technologies in the workplace.

Abstract

Despite the rapid proliferation of AI tools, we know little about how people who use them are perceived by others. Drawing on theories of attribution and impression management, we propose that people believe they will be evaluated negatively by others for using AI tools and that this belief is justified. We examine these predictions in four preregistered experiments (N = 4,439) and find that people who use AI at work anticipate and receive negative evaluations regarding their competence and motivation. Further, we find evidence that these social evaluations affect assessments of job candidates. Our findings reveal a dilemma for people considering adopting AI tools: Although AI can enhance productivity, its use carries social costs.

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[-] [email protected] 6 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

The association between AI use and laziness perceptions is dependent upon the evaluators’ own AI use, and perceptions of laziness can be offset for tasks in which AI is clearly useful.

This work demonstrated that the use of productivity-enhancing tools can, paradoxically, erode social evaluations of their operators’ competence and motivation.

I do remember calculators being referred to as a crutch in the context of learning mathematics because doing the work was part of learning. The expectation was that harder work would be suitable after learning how to do the work first, so you knew if the output matched what you intended to input. There has always been concerns about over reliance on automation of any type.

But AI is so unreliable that a calculator is not a good comparison. It often is being used as a crutch as well, since everyone who openly talks about using AI at my office seem to just copy/paste the output and don't do anything to clean up the incorrect parts. That is what gives the appearance of being lazy or less competent to those of us who see the downsides as outweighing the benefits. Those that are all in on AI sure do like patting each other on the back about using the hot new tools though!

this post was submitted on 12 May 2025
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