The Impact of AI on Team Cooperation

Last registered on May 18, 2026
View Trial History

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
The Impact of AI on Team Cooperation
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0018641
Initial registration date
May 13, 2026

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
May 18, 2026, 7:19 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country
China
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Xianling Long
Affiliation
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Kaixing Huang
PI Affiliation
PI Name
Lulu Pi
PI Affiliation

Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2025-05-20
End date
2025-10-30
Keywords
Behavior, Labor
Additional Keywords
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
As artificial intelligence increasingly enters work, decision-making, and collaborative settings, an important question arises: does the introduction of AI promote or weaken human team cooperation? Existing research has focused more on the effects of AI on individual decision-making, productivity, and judgment accuracy. However, there is still a lack of direct evidence on how AI changes information exchange, trust formation, responsibility allocation, and collaborative performance among team members.

This study proposes to use the card game Guandan, played in two-person teams against another team, as the experimental setting to examine how the introduction of AI into the team collaboration process affects the quality of team cooperation, communication patterns, perceived trust, and task performance. Guandan is chosen as the research setting mainly because the task has a clear common objective, strong team-coordination features, quantifiable cooperation outcomes, and high operational feasibility.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Huang, Kaixing, Xianling Long and Lulu Pi. 2026. "The Impact of AI on Team Cooperation." AEA RCT Registry. May 18. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.18641-1.0
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
The intervention varies the presence of AI in a two-person team-based Guandan game. Treatment conditions include: whether AI is actually introduced as a teammate; whether a human teammate is replaced by another human; whether teammate test-round performance is disclosed.
Intervention (Hidden)
Intervention Start Date
2025-05-20
Intervention End Date
2025-07-30

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Main outcomes include team cooperation quality, communication patterns, perceived trust, responsibility attribution, strategic choices, task performance, collaboration efficiency, and win/loss outcomes. Additional recorded outcomes include game records and round-level results.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
Participants are randomly assigned to experimental conditions before the experiment begins. The randomization is organized around two dimensions. First, the study varies whether a participant’s original teammate is replaced in the formal task, and whether the replacement is another human participant or an AI robot. Second, the study varies whether participants are informed of their teammate’s performance in the test round, including the test-round performance of an AI teammate when applicable.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomization will be conducted by computer before the experiment begins.
Randomization Unit
Individual.
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
400 individuals
Sample size: planned number of observations
400 individual-level observations. In terms of gameplay, participants are organized into four-person groups, implying approximately 100 four-person experimental groups. Since each participant completes one test round and two formal rounds, the planned design also generates approximately 1,200 participant-round observations.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
approximately equal allocation across 6 arms, around 67 individuals per treatment arm.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
National School of Development (Peking University) Institutional Review Board
IRB Approval Date
2026-05-11
IRB Approval Number
CZY2026003
Analysis Plan

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials