Effects of Gender and Relationship Type on the Response to Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence (AI) has had a huge impact on our lives. In this study, we suggest that when people interact with AI, they regard the AI as a social actor and apply interpersonal relationship norms. This study employed a 2 × 2 between-subjects design to identify the effects of an AI's relationship type and gender on a human's response to an AI speaker (relationship type: friend vs. servant; gender: male vs. female). Findings show that the relationship type has a significant effect on warmth and pleasure but not on competence. The gender of the AI showed no significant effects on competence, warmth, or pleasure when controlling for the participants' gender. In addition, the results indicate that anthropomorphism fully mediated the relationship between both warmth and pleasure and the type of relationship with AI. Our findings suggest that AI is regarded as a social actor, and the characteristics of AI should be considered as they influence the response to AI.