Moral behaviour alters impressions of humans and AIs on teams: unethical AIs are more powerful while ethical humans are nicer

Daniel B. Shank, Matthew Dew and Fatima Sajjad

Behaviour and Information Technology, 2025, vol. 44, issue 11, 2637-2648

Abstract: Artificial intelligence (AI) agents are increasingly being used as teammates, not just as tools, across many domains, and teammates’ moral behaviour can alter impressions of themselves and the team. How good, powerful, and active is an AI versus human team member engaging in an ethical or unethical behaviour? How good, powerful, and active is their team? To address these questions, we conduct four studies across three domains (chess, esports, and poetry composition) where participants rate their impressions of team members and teams presented in a scenario. In the scenario, a member of a hybrid team of 2 humans and 2 AIs is presented with an opportunity to cheat, and either does or does not. We manipulate which team member (AI vs human) is acting and the morality of that action (non-cheating vs cheating). Across the studies, results show that ethical behaviour significantly increases the goodness of the human more than the AI, and unethical behaviour significantly increases the power of the AI more than the human. However, there were no systematic human versus AI differences on team impressions.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/0144929X.2024.2403651

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