Artificial intelligence and psychology

Abstract

This chapter explores relationships between the science and profession of psychology and the development of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotic systems. It briefly examines the role of psychology in the development of AI systems and theories. There is a long and intimate history of such a relationship, exemplified in the arts and the social sciences as well as in computer science and engineering. The chapter examines the role that psychology has played in the understanding of the ways in which humans interact with contemporary AI systems, to influence the behaviour of the systems and, in turn, to be influenced by them. Human decision making has been shown to be improved by factors other than intelligence and thereby appears to be a quality which would be retained by humans rather than machines, for example motivational processes, emotions and experience. The chapter examines the state of the profession of psychology and helping professions in the light of developments in AI.