Humans as Creativity Gatekeepers: Are We Biased Against AI Creativity?

Abstract With artificial intelligence (AI) increasingly involved in the creation of organizational and commercial artifacts, human evaluators’ role as creativity gatekeepers of AI-produced artifacts will become critical for innovation processes. However, when humans evaluate creativity, their judgment is clouded by biases triggered by the characteristics of the creator. Drawing from folk psychology and algorithm aversion research, we examine whether the identity of the producer of a given artifact as artificial…

By the Truvace deskOctober 9, 20261 min read1 sourcePeer-reviewedTRV-2026-1317· cite & verify

In brief

Researchers examined how knowing a creator is AI versus human affects creativity judgments for organizational and commercial artifacts. Across four experiments with 2039 participants, they found people sometimes rated the same product as less creative when told it came from AI.

The finding matters because human evaluators act as gatekeepers for innovation as AI tools spread in workplaces. The work suggests effort perceptions drive the discount, but the effect was not present in every condition, leaving open when and how strongly the bias will shape adoption of AI-produced work.

Main points

Four experimental studies with total N = 2039, two pre-registered, tested creativity ratings for AI versus human producers.
Bias was inconsistent: lower creativity ascribed to AI in some designs and targets but not in all conditions.
Mediation finding: perceived effort explains the discount, with AI seen as exerting less effort than humans.

The problem

Human evaluators discounted creativity when told a product was made by AI instead of a human, driven by the belief that generative AI exerts less effort.

The rundown

The authors ran four experiments totaling 2039 participants, varying designs and evaluation targets, with two studies pre-registered, to test whether producer identity triggers bias.

Results showed a consistent perception that generative AI exerts less effort than humans, and this perception mediated lower creativity ratings when the AI label was disclosed.