Artificial Intelligence in the Military : How its Framing as a Decision Support Tool vs. an Autonomous Decision-Maker Affects Trust of Young Adults : A Survey Experiment

As artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly being integrated into military operations, and raising concerns about safety, effectiveness and ethics, it is essential to understand people’s trust in those systems. This study investigates how the framing of such a system as either a decision-support tool (providing recommendations to a human commander) or as an autonomous decision-maker (independently engaging a target) affects trust in young adults. In a survey experiment, participants were randomly allocated to one of those conditions and were presented different scenarios of such an AI application in action. Their trust levels across scenarios were measured using the Trust in Automation Scale. The results revealed that young adults trusted the system significantly more when it acted as a decision-support tool. Moreover, military knowledge was positively correlated with trust, while AI knowledge was not. The findings of this study emphasise the importance of transparency and human oversight for human-AI interactions and particularly for trust in military systems.