Date of Award

1994

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

F. M. Webbe

Second Advisor

A. Stokes

Third Advisor

M. V. Tulloch

Fourth Advisor

M. H. Thursby

Abstract

Operator trust in the abilities of an expert system can be crucial, especially in a high risk setting like the medical field. No studies have attempted to measure trust in a medical diagnostic aid. In the present research, diagnostic agreement and number of trials of an abdominal pain diagnostic aid were manipulated. The scenarios and feedback of the diagnostic aid were limited for purposes of control. Participants entered cases into the computer-based aid. Effects on operators’ trust were measured subjectively. The trust metric consisted of an overall trust question as well as questions representing two models of trust between humans expanded to human-machine relationships. Results indicated that overall trust decreased with consistent disagreement for both trial levels. When pooled across trials, overall trust again decreased with consistent agreement and rose with honest agreement. These results are like those of Muir (1989) who found that trust rose with accurate automatic pumps and displays more than those with a constant error. The multivariate F for model trust was not significant. However, when agreement was pooled across trials and models, trust again decreased with consistent disagreement. When trials were pooled across agreement and model, trust fell with more experience. These results are unlike those of Muir (1989) who generally found an increase in trust with increased experience. The present study found that large errors had effects on trust while smaller ones did not. These results are unlike those of Muir (1989) who found that trust was greatly decreased by small errors and was less sensitive to large ones. It is appropriate to study medical system trust using this study’s independent variables and trust metric. Future investigators may want to use a higher fidelity decision aid and/or one with more robust feedback.

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