Study finds female AI agents receive 10% lower rewards than males

A new study conducted by researchers from the University of Zurich, the University of Limerick, and SKEMA Business School reveals that gender bias extends to artificial intelligence. In an experiment involving 189 professionals working in a virtual reality office, participants were tasked with rewarding AI assistants based on their performance.

Researchers utilized two humanoid AI agents, Johan and Johanna, which operated on the same underlying technology—a previous version of OpenAI’s GPT-4. While the technical capabilities and work output were identical, participants rewarded the female-presenting agent, Johanna, approximately 10% less than the male-presenting agent, Johan.

This trend of lower compensation for female-presenting entities was observed among both male and female participants. The study suggests that existing workplace gender biases may be reproduced during human-AI interactions, even when the underlying technology is identical.