Does One Bad Machine Spoil the Bunch?: A Review of Trust in Multiple-Component Systems

Abstract

Human-automation interactions are rapidly transitioning from single-component automated systems to multiple-component systems. The human-automation literature has yet to adequately explore trust within multiple-component systems. A currently unanswered question is whether one faulty component causes an operator to lose trust in that one component (Component-Specific Trust; CST) or in every component in the system (System-Wide Trust; SWT). The goals of this paper were to 1) summarize the current work on trust in multiple-component systems, and 2) identify any trends that emerge during the literature review. We reviewed 17 experimental studies that tested whether operators tend to adopt CST or SWT under different conditions. Overall, most studies suggest that operators adopt SWT. However, studies that provided the operator with high decisional freedom and more time with the automated systems suggest that CST is the dominant strategy. Future work should explicitly test these and other variables that may promote users to adopt CST.