Behaviormay

Behaviormay is a theoretical construct used in behavioral science and artificial intelligence ethics to denote the range of behaviors an agent could exhibit under a given set of conditions. It emphasizes potentiality and contingency rather than a single, determinate prediction. The concept appears in modeling and policy discussions to reflect uncertainty about future actions in complex systems.

The term is a portmanteau of "behavior" and the modal word "may," signaling that actions may or may not occur depending on inputs, context, and stochastic elements.

In practice, behaviormay is often operationalized as a collection of scenarios, probability distributions over actions, or qualitative ranges (for example, unlikely, possible, probable). It serves to acknowledge uncertainty and can guide safe design by exploring multiple potential responses.

Applications include autonomous systems safety, user-behavior modeling, and policy analysis, where designers assess how an agent could respond to changing stimuli or constraints.

Critics argue that the term can be vague without explicit metrics, and that it may be misinterpreted as a forecast rather than a set of contingencies, potentially obscuring underlying assumptions.

Related ideas include scenario analysis, counterfactual reasoning, probabilistic prediction, and risk assessment.