Human versus non-human agents who make predictions of service delivery: An examination of user responses to agents’ view of the future

Consumers often ask service providers for predictions about future events in service processes, and the current study examines reactions to service agents' predictions about when an event will happen. More specifically, since it has been argued that non-human service agents (such as chatbots) will be increasingly common, the study assesses if service agent identity (human vs. AI-powered chatbot) influences receivers' reactions to the agent's when-predictions. This identity aspect has so far not been addressed in the service literature on reducing uncertainty about future events. Two between-subjects experiments, in which agent identity was manipulated in a flight delay context, were conducted for this assessment. The main result was that a human service agent generated a more positive evaluation of a when-prediction than a non-human agent. The study also provides explanations for this result in terms of underlying mechanisms: the impact of agent identity on the evaluation of a prediction was found to be (serially) mediated by attribution of mind to the agent and the agent's perceived prediction skills. Conceptually, attribution of theory of mind (the capability to understand other’ minds) is a highly needed capability when it comes to predicting future events – particularly in a service systems in which several human minds are involved. The main result implies that firms' responses to customers' requests for when-predictions would benefit if the predictions are delivered by a human service agent rather than a non-human service agent.