Online reviews serve as a guide for consumer choice. With advancements in large language models (LLMs) and generative AI, the fast and inexpensive creation of human-like text may threaten the feedback function of online reviews if neither readers nor platforms can differentiate between human-written and AI-generated content. In two experiments, we found that humans cannot recognize AI-written reviews. Even with monetary incentives for accuracy, both Type I and Type II errors were common: human reviews were often mistaken for AI-generated reviews, and even more frequently, AI-generated reviews were mistaken for human reviews. This held true across various ratings, emotional tones, review lengths, and participants’ genders, education levels, and AI expertise. Younger participants were somewhat better at distinguishing between human and AI reviews. An additional study revealed that current AI detectors were also fooled by AI-generated reviews. We discuss the implications of our findings on trust erosion, manipulation, regulation, consumer behavior, AI detection, market structure, innovation, and review platforms.
Seems like good old Word Of Mouth where information is relayed among people who know each other in real life, is probably going to make a big comeback for this kind of stuff.
Because if you can’t trust any media on the internet being “real” the only trustworthy sources you’ll have is the real people in your real life.
Seems like good old Word Of Mouth where information is relayed among people who know each other in real life, is probably going to make a big comeback for this kind of stuff.
Because if you can’t trust any media on the internet being “real” the only trustworthy sources you’ll have is the real people in your real life.
Maybe this will lead to the Internet going back to how it used to be in the beginning. Wouldn’t that be something.
Boy I can’t wait for the flash animation renaissance
Along with non-profit verified review orgs like Consumer Reports.
I would never trust any recommendations of any people I know.
Are you sure? Because that might say as much about you as about the people you know.
The average person is notoriously shit at doing objective analysis, so yeah, you shouldn’t trust people you know.
It definitely does.