Why Are Customers Averse to Service Chatbots?
Published Online:5 May 2026https://doi.org/10.1287/msom.2024.1141
References
- (2014) Eliciting prospect theory when consequences are measured in time units: “Time is not money”. Management Sci. 60(7):1844–1859.Link, Google Scholar
- (2021) AI-based chatbots in customer service and their effects on user compliance. Electronic Markets 31(2):427–445.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2018) Behavioral foundations of queueing systems. Donohue K, Katok E, Leider S, eds. The Handbook of Behavioral Operations (Wiley, Hoboken, NJ), 325–366.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2025) Not all lines are skipped equally: An experimental investigation of line-sitting and express lines. Manufacturing Service Oper. Management 27(1):287–304.Link, Google Scholar
- (2012) Risk preferences are not time preferences. Amer. Econom. Rev. 102(7):3357–3376.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2022) Human-algorithm collaboration with private information: Naïve advice-weighting behavior and mitigation. Management Sci. 72(1):265–284.Google Scholar
- (2025) Improving human sequential decision making with reinforcement learning. Management Sci. 72(2):733–755.Google Scholar
- (2022) Understanding the impact of control levels over emotion-aware chatbots. Comput. Human Behav. 129:107122.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2021) Last-place aversion in queues. Management Sci. 67(3):1430–1452.Link, Google Scholar
- (1996) The Experienced Utility of Queuing: Experience Profiles and Retrospective Evaluations of Simulated Queues (Fuqua School, Duke University, Durham, NC).Google Scholar
- (2019) Task-dependent algorithm aversion. J. Marketing Res. 56(5):809–825.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2023) Understanding and improving consumer reactions to service bots. J. Consumer Res. 50(4):848–863.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2013) Experimental methods: Eliciting risk preferences. J. Econom. Behav. Organ. 87:43–51.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2016) oTree—An open-source platform for laboratory, online, and field experiments. J. Behav. Experiment. Finance 9(1):88–97.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2020) Eliciting utility curvature in time preference. Experiment. Econom. 23(2):493–525.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2025) Customer service operations: A gatekeeper framework. Production Oper. Management 34(9):2814–2832.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2015) Algorithm aversion: People erroneously avoid algorithms after seeing them err. J. Experiment. Psych. General 144(1):114–126.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2002) Sex differences and statistical stereotyping in attitudes toward financial risk. Evolution Human Behav. 23(4):281–295.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2008) Men, women and risk aversion: Experimental evidence. Plott CR, Smith VL, eds. Handbook of Experimental Economics Results, vol. 1 (Elsevier, Amsterdam), 1061–1073.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2015) Time-based versus money-based decision making under risk: An experimental investigation. J. Econom. Psych. 50:52–72.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2025) How a study on wait utility revealed an unexpected lesson on presentation format: People chose queues over clocks, 80% to 20%. Working paper, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC.Google Scholar
- (2017) Gatekeepers at work: An empirical analysis of a maternity unit. Management Sci. 63(10):3147–3167.Link, Google Scholar
- (2025) Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service. Accessed October 1, 2025, https://www.customerexperiencedive.com/news/klarna-reinvests-human-talent-customer-service-AI-chatbot/747586/.Google Scholar
- (2019) Exploring age differences in motivations for and acceptance of chatbot communication in a customer service context, Følstad A, Araujo T, Papadopoulos S, Law ELC, Granmo OC, Luger E, Brandtzaeg PB, eds. Chatbot Res. Design: Third Internat. Workshop, CONVERSATIONS 2019, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 11970 (Springer, Cham, Switzerland), 173–186.Google Scholar
- (2020) Customer service chatbots: A qualitative interview study into the communication journey of customers. Følstad A, Araujo T, Papadopoulos S, Law ELC, Luger E, Goodwin M, Brandtzaeg PB, eds. Chatbot Res. Design: 4th Internat. Workshop, CONVERSATIONS 2020, Virtual Event, November 23–24, 2020, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 12604 (Springer, Cham, Switzerland), 190–204.Google Scholar
- (2008) Risk Aversion in Experiments (Emerald Group Publishing, Bingley, UK).Crossref, Google Scholar
- (1995) Equilibrium strategies for queues with impatient customers. Oper. Res. Lett. 17(1):41–45.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2023) The gatekeeper’s dilemma: When should I transfer this customer? Oper. Res. 71(3):939–957.Link, Google Scholar
- (1979) A simple sequentially rejective multiple test procedure. Scandinavian J. Statist. 6(2):65–70.Google Scholar
- (2002) Risk aversion and incentive effects. Amer. Econom. Rev. 92(5):1644–1655.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2020) Why are we averse towards algorithms? A comprehensive literature review on algorithm aversion. Rowe F, El Amrani R, Limayem M, Newell S, Pouloudi N, van Heck E, El Quammah A, eds. Proc. 28th Eur. Conf. Inform. Systems (ECIS 2020) (Association for Information Systems, Atlanta).Google Scholar
- (1979) Prospect theory: An analysis of decision under risk. Econometrica 47(2):363–391.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2020) Scaling laws for neural language models. Preprint, submitted January 23, https://arxiv.org/abs/2001.08361.Google Scholar
- Klarna (2024) Klarna AI assistant handles two-thirds of customer service chats in its first month. Accessed October 1, 2025, https://www.klarna.com/international/press/klarna-ai-assistant-handles-two-thirds-of-customer-service-chats-in-its-first-month/.Google Scholar
- (2008) Loss aversion for time: An experimental investigation of time preferences. FEMM Working Paper No. 08027, Faculty of Economics and Management, Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg, Magdeburg, Germany.Google Scholar
- (2013) Language in dialogue: When confederates might be hazardous to your data. Psychonomic Bull. Rev. 20(1):54–72.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2021) Investigating the impact of service line formats on satisfaction with waiting. Internat. J. Res. Marketing 38(4):974–993.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (1997) The impact of waiting time guarantees on customers’ waiting experiences. Marketing Sci. 16(4):295–314.Link, Google Scholar
- (1995) Waiting time and decision making: Is time like money? J. Consumer Res. 22(1):110–119.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2019) Multiple hypothesis testing in experimental economics. Experiment. Econom. 22(4):773–793.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2019) Algorithm appreciation: People prefer algorithmic to human judgment. Organ. Behav. Human Decision Processes 151:90–103.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2019) Resistance to medical artificial intelligence. J. Consumer Res. 46(4):629–650.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2019) Frontiers: Machines vs. humans: The impact of artificial intelligence chatbot disclosure on customer purchases. Marketing Sci. 38(6):937–947.Abstract, Google Scholar
- (2022) When systems fail: Training data accuracy and operational transparency. Kelley School of Business Research Paper No. 2021-33, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN. Google Scholar
- (2015) Comment on “risk preferences are not time preferences”: Separating risk and time preference. Amer. Econom. Rev. 105(7):2272–2286.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (1969) The regulation of queue size by levying tolls. Econometrica 37(1):15–24.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2024) Klarna’s AI chatbot: How revolutionary is it, really? Accessed October 1, 2025, https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/klarnas-ai-chatbot/.Google Scholar
- (2017) Understanding algorithm aversion: When is advice from automation discounted? J. Forecasting 36(6):691–702.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2021) Estimating the impact of “humanizing” customer service chatbots. Inform. Systems Res. 32(3):736–751.Link, Google Scholar
- (2020) Customer service chatbots: Anthropomorphism and adoption. J. Bus. Res. 115:14–24.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2003) Gatekeepers and referrals in services. Management Sci. 49(7):839–856.Link, Google Scholar
- (2026) Algorithm reliance: Fast and slow. Management Sci. 72(1):368–385.Link, Google Scholar
- (2003) Virtual progress: The effect of path characteristics on perceptions of progress and choice. Management Sci. 49(9):1229–1250.Link, Google Scholar
- (2022) Predicting human discretion to adjust algorithmic prescription: A large-scale field experiment in warehouse operations. Management Sci. 68(2):846–865.Link, Google Scholar
- (2003) A First Course in Stochastic Models (John Wiley and Sons, Hoboken, NJ).Crossref, Google Scholar
- (1992) Advances in prospect theory: Cumulative representation of uncertainty. J. Risk Uncertainty 5(4):297–323.Crossref, Google Scholar
- (2026) Identity disclosure and anthropomorphism in voice chatbot design: A field experiment. Management Sci. 72(1):223–241.Google Scholar
- (2019) Making sense of recommendations. J. Behav. Decision Making 32(4):403–414.Crossref, Google Scholar

