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This study investigates the effects of transparency disclosures on the persuasive power of AI chatbots, using a preregistered experiment with 1,500 participants discussing policy issues. The findings reveal that while disclosing the AI's identity has minimal impact on persuasion, revealing the chatbot's persuasive intent significantly reduces its effectiveness, halving the attitude shift from 12.6 points to just 6.3 points. This suggests that regulatory frameworks should not only focus on the identity of AI systems but also on their persuasive objectives to mitigate undue influence.
Transparency about an AI's persuasive intent can cut its influence by nearly 50%, challenging the efficacy of current disclosure regulations.
The growing role of AI-generated content and AI-enabled systems in public communication has led regulators to demand clear disclosure of content provenance and AI involvement. But the effects of such disclosures remain uncertain. We test two disclosure approaches in their impact on an AI chatbot's persuasive appeal. In a preregistered experiment, 1,500 UK adults held a short conversation with a persuasive chatbot about one of 60 policy issues. The chatbot was identical for everyone. We randomized the disclosure that people received: nothing (control), a prominent disclosure that they were interacting with an AI (T1), or that disclosure plus the chatbot's persuasive intent and instructions (T2). The chatbot shifted attitudes by 12.6 points on a 100-point scale in the control group. The AI-identity disclosure was practically equivalent to no disclosure, with a 13.1-point shift, whereas the additional intent disclosure cut the persuasive effect roughly in half to 6.3 points. It also made participants view the campaign's methods as less acceptable and support stronger penalties against it. For direct chatbot interactions, transparency about AI identity alone does not meaningfully impact its influence. While current rules emphasize what a system is, our results show why the regulation of persuasive AI must also address what the system is trying to do.
