Digital Confessions: The Willingness to Disclose Intimate Information to a Chatbot and its Impact on Emotional Well-Being

Abstract Chatbots have several features that may stimulate self-disclosure, such as accessibility, anonymity, convenience and their perceived non-judgmental nature. The aim of this study is to investigate if people disclose (more) intimate information to a chatbot, compared to a human, and to what e...

Ausführliche Beschreibung

Gespeichert in:
Bibliographische Detailangaben
Veröffentlicht in:Interacting with computers Jg. 36; H. 5; S. 279 - 292
Hauptverfasser: Croes, Emmelyn A J, Antheunis, Marjolijn L, van der Lee, Chris, de Wit, Jan M S
Format: Journal Article
Sprache:Englisch
Veröffentlicht: Oxford University Press 01.09.2024
Schlagworte:
trust
chatbot
anonymity
self-disclosure
fear of judgment
self-expression
ISSN:0953-5438, 1873-7951
Online-Zugang:Volltext
Tags: Tag hinzufügen
Keine Tags, Fügen Sie den ersten Tag hinzu!
Beschreibung
Zusammenfassung:Abstract Chatbots have several features that may stimulate self-disclosure, such as accessibility, anonymity, convenience and their perceived non-judgmental nature. The aim of this study is to investigate if people disclose (more) intimate information to a chatbot, compared to a human, and to what extent this enhances their emotional well-being through feelings of relief. An experiment with a 2 (human vs. chatbot) by 2 (low empathetic vs. high empathetic) design was conducted (N = 286). Results showed that there was no difference in the self-reported intimacy of self-disclosure between the human and chatbot conditions. Furthermore, people perceived less fear of judgment in the chatbot condition, but more trust in the human interactant compared to the chatbot interactant. Perceived anonymity was the only variable to directly impact self-disclosure intimacy. The finding that humans disclose equally intimate information to chatbots and humans is in line with the CASA paradigm, which states that people can react in a social manner to both computers and humans.
ISSN:0953-5438
1873-7951
DOI:10.1093/iwc/iwae016