Lay beliefs about AI assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selection
Abstract Artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing talent acquisition, with organizations increasingly replacing humans with AI technologies in personnel selection processes. Field studies of nurses provide preliminary evidence that AI can outperform humans in predicting interpersonal skills....
Saved in:
| Main Authors: | , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Nature Portfolio
2025-07-01
|
| Series: | Scientific Reports |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-10358-7 |
| Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1849333397216821248 |
|---|---|
| author | Ilyung Cheong Young Eun Huh Stefano Puntoni |
| author_facet | Ilyung Cheong Young Eun Huh Stefano Puntoni |
| author_sort | Ilyung Cheong |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract Artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing talent acquisition, with organizations increasingly replacing humans with AI technologies in personnel selection processes. Field studies of nurses provide preliminary evidence that AI can outperform humans in predicting interpersonal skills. However, a series of surveys and experiments document widespread lay beliefs in the opposite direction: individuals perceive AI as being less capable than humans in assessing interpersonal skills. This effect was not observed for analytical skills, suggesting that the results stem from lay beliefs about the suitability of AI in interpersonal contexts and not from a generalized aversion to algorithms. These lay beliefs bias managers’ perceptions of employees: managers were less likely to assign tasks requiring interpersonal skills to AI-selected (vs. human-selected) employees. Additionally, applicants reported reducing their emphasis on interpersonal (vs. analytical) skills during AI (vs. human) selection processes. Informing participants about advanced AI selection technologies reduced negative lay beliefs about AI performance in the interpersonal domains. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-590555e95a944e98a2a8f5f06ac8338f |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2045-2322 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-07-01 |
| publisher | Nature Portfolio |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Scientific Reports |
| spelling | doaj-art-590555e95a944e98a2a8f5f06ac8338f2025-08-20T03:45:52ZengNature PortfolioScientific Reports2045-23222025-07-011511810.1038/s41598-025-10358-7Lay beliefs about AI assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selectionIlyung Cheong0Young Eun Huh1Stefano Puntoni2School of Business and Technology Management, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and TechnologySchool of Business and Technology Management, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and TechnologyWharton School, University of PennsylvaniaAbstract Artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing talent acquisition, with organizations increasingly replacing humans with AI technologies in personnel selection processes. Field studies of nurses provide preliminary evidence that AI can outperform humans in predicting interpersonal skills. However, a series of surveys and experiments document widespread lay beliefs in the opposite direction: individuals perceive AI as being less capable than humans in assessing interpersonal skills. This effect was not observed for analytical skills, suggesting that the results stem from lay beliefs about the suitability of AI in interpersonal contexts and not from a generalized aversion to algorithms. These lay beliefs bias managers’ perceptions of employees: managers were less likely to assign tasks requiring interpersonal skills to AI-selected (vs. human-selected) employees. Additionally, applicants reported reducing their emphasis on interpersonal (vs. analytical) skills during AI (vs. human) selection processes. Informing participants about advanced AI selection technologies reduced negative lay beliefs about AI performance in the interpersonal domains.https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-10358-7 |
| spellingShingle | Ilyung Cheong Young Eun Huh Stefano Puntoni Lay beliefs about AI assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selection Scientific Reports |
| title | Lay beliefs about AI assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selection |
| title_full | Lay beliefs about AI assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selection |
| title_fullStr | Lay beliefs about AI assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selection |
| title_full_unstemmed | Lay beliefs about AI assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selection |
| title_short | Lay beliefs about AI assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selection |
| title_sort | lay beliefs about ai assessment of interpersonal skills in personnel selection |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-10358-7 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT ilyungcheong laybeliefsaboutaiassessmentofinterpersonalskillsinpersonnelselection AT youngeunhuh laybeliefsaboutaiassessmentofinterpersonalskillsinpersonnelselection AT stefanopuntoni laybeliefsaboutaiassessmentofinterpersonalskillsinpersonnelselection |