Are case managers willing to entrust counseling tasks to artificial intelligence? The role of administrative discretion, client interaction, and technology attitudes

This study investigates case managers’ willingness to entrust counseling tasks to decision-support systems using Artificial Intelligence (AI). We theorize three factors influencing this willingness: the discretionary nature of the task, the salience of client interaction in case managers’ professional identity, and their preconceptions of AI. To test the explanatory power of these factors, we conducted an online survey, including a priming experiment, among 1415 front-line case managers from the German Federal Employment Agency. The empirical results show (1) task-associated discretionary power decreases case managers’ willingness to entrust counseling tasks to AI, (2) in contrast to priming technology usage, the client interaction prime has no effect, while (3) attitudes toward AI have a substantive effect on case managers’ willingness to entrust counseling tasks to AI. These findings have important policy implications for public employment services as they help prioritize which tasks in job counseling deserve special attention in their digitalization strategies.