ÃÈÃÃÉçÇø

A trio of business analysts at Duke University has found that people who use AI apps at work are perceived by their colleagues as less diligent, lazier and less competent than those who do not use them.

In their study, in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Jessica Reif, Richard Larrick and Jack Soll carried out four online experiments asking 4,400 participants to imagine they were in scenarios in which some workers used AI and some did not, and how they viewed themselves or others working under such circumstances.

Over the past couple of years, AI apps such as ChatGPT have become popular for both recreational and work-related purposes. In this new effort, the research trio looked at how AI use is viewed by people in the workforce. Their work involved conducting four online experiments.

The first experiment involved asking participants to imagine themselves using an AI app or dashboard creation tool to complete work projects. The next part of the experiment involved asking those same users how they thought others in their workplace would view them if they used such applications. The researchers found that many of the respondents believed they would be judged as lazy, less diligent and less competent. They also suggested they might be viewed as more easily replaced than those who refused to use such apps to get their work done.

The second experiment involved asking participants to describe how they viewed colleagues at work who used AI apps to get their work done. The researchers found many viewed such colleagues as less competent at their jobs, lazy, less independent, less self-assured and less diligent.

In the third experiment, participants were asked to pretend they were managers who were hiring someone for a position at work. They found that such managers were less likely to hire someone if that candidate admitted to using AI to get their work done. One exception was when the manager was someone who used AI at work.

The fourth experiment involved asking participants about another aspect of AI use on the job: when it was known to be helpful. In such scenarios, negative perceptions diminished for the most part.

The research team notes that one factor made a difference in all their experiments: If the participants actually used AI at work, they saw its use by themselves or others in a much more positive light.

© 2025 Science X Network