Computer-Mediated Trust in Self-Interested Expert Recommendations

Jonathan Ben-Naim (1, 2) , Jean-François Bonnefon (3, 2) , Andreas Herzig (1, 2) , Sylvie Leblois (4) , Emiliano Lorini (1, 2)

1 IRIT-LILaC - Logique, Interaction, Langue et Calcul
2 CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
3 CLLE-LTC - Cognition, Langues, Langage, Ergonomie
4 CLLE - Cognition, langues, langage, ergonomie

Important decisions are often based on a distributed process of information processing, from a knowledge base that is itself distributed among agents. The simplest such situation is that where a decision-maker seeks the recommendations of experts. Because experts may have vested interests in the consequences of their recommendations, decision-makers usually seek the advice of experts they trust. Trust, however, is a commodity that is usually built through repeated face time and social interaction and thus cannot easily be built in a global world where we have immediate internet access to a vast pool of experts. In this article, we integrate findings from experimental psychology and formal tools from Artificial Intelligence to offer a preliminary roadmap for solving the problem of trust in this computer-mediated environment. We conclude the article by considering a diverse array of extended applications of such a solution.

Mots clés: Trust; Expert; Conflict of interest; Agent; Reputation

Domaines: Intelligence artificielle [cs.AI]

Jonathan Ben-Naim, Jean-François Bonnefon, Andreas Herzig, Sylvie Leblois, Emiliano Lorini. Computer-Mediated Trust in Self-Interested Expert Recommendations. AI & Society: Knowledge, Culture and Communication, 2009, 25 (4), pp.413-422. ⟨10.1007/s00146-010-0268-4⟩. ⟨hal-03466389⟩