Bridging Formal and Perceived Fairness: Development of an Interdisciplinary Framework in Algorithmic Decision-Making

2026-09-03

AI Summary

论文提出一种跨学科框架，通过结合计算机科学与社会科学的方法，解决算法决策中正式公平性与感知公平性之间的差距问题。

Abstract

While fairness has become a central concern in research on algorithmic systems, the field remains predominantly shaped by Computer Science, resulting in a strong emphasis on formal fairness metrics and bias mitigation strategies. Nevertheless, this focus may obscure a fundamental challenge: fairness is not merely a technical property, but a subjective, context-sensitive human judgment shaped by cognitive heuristics, mental models, normative expectations, and sociotechnical factors. Crucially, users' perceptions of fairness may diverge substantially from the fairness criteria an algorithm formally satisfies; a system may meet predefined technical fairness requirements yet still be perceived as unjust by decision-affected stakeholders. In such cases, the system fails on a fundamental dimension: it will not be trusted, accepted, or considered legitimate. Taking a user-centered design perspective, this paper presents a work-in-progress conceptual framework that bridges Computer Science approaches to formal algorithmic fairness with normative and Social Science fairness approaches regarding perceived fairness, trust, and technology acceptance, embedding both within the sociotechnical conditions that shape human judgment. Through (1) theoretical literature synthesis, (2) interdisciplinary workshops, and (3) stakeholder interviews, the project aims to inform evaluation approaches that integrate computational fairness audits with user-centered assessments and guide the design of fairness-aware, human-centered algorithmic systems that support informed, well-calibrated fairness judgments by those affected.

Problem

• Algorithmic Fairness
• Perceived Fairness
• Sociotechnical Factors
• Trust
• Technology Acceptance

Innovation

• algorithmic fairness
• perceived fairness
• interdisciplinary framework
• user-centered design