As the second guest speaker for the Research Seminar, Caroline Wiertz, Deputy Dean and Professor of Marketing at Bayes Business School (formerly Cass), presented her and her co-worker’s work on aspects on financial AI Adoption.

Research on Artificial intelligence (AI) has mostly focused on choices between human or machine actors. Generally, people choose humans over machines in contexts that require emotional abilities (e.g. medical services) but machines over humans when utilitarian task performance is key.

Caroline and her co-workers investigate which aspects of AI drive consumers’ choices in a field where such utilitarian task performance is emphasized – financial technology, e.g. AI powered financial advisory services. They show through initial evidence from three experiments, that among psychological attributes, consumers value privacy and the auditability of the AI services, whereas personalization of the service is the least important aspect. If performance and price of the service are added, they become the main drivers of choice, trailed again by privacy and auditability.

This research gives insights into consumers’ preferences for aspects of AI services and informs services providers how to best structure their financial-AI offerings to meet consumers’ needs. 

We thank Caroline for her time and sharing her excellent insights with us.