Technological Change

Rapid advances in autonomous systems raise fascinating behavioral questions. In particular, for the Department of Defense, understanding how factors like trust, risk and organizational incentives could shape the development, use and effectiveness of autonomous systems will be critical. In order to answer these questions, experts will need to move beyond the purely technical factors and models of effectiveness traditionally used in military analysis and utilize a broader range of behavioral science tools and organizational theory.

This project, led by Professor Julia Macdonald and funded by a Minerva Research Grant, seeks to understand the human, organizational and political factors that affect the willingness of individuals and bureaucracies to adopt autonomous systems, and the potential consequences of these attitudes.