Does artificial intelligence cause artificial confidence? Generative artificial intelligence as an emerging social referent

Bibliographic Data

ID6197968
AuthorsTaly Reich (0000-0002-2978-4406, New York University), Jacob D Teeny (0000-0001-6112-534X, Kellogg's (Canada))
Year2025
Volume130
Issue3
Pages452-464
Publication date2025-04-28
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Personality and Social Psychology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-3514 • E-ISSN: 1939-1315
PublisherAmerican Psychological Association (APA) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1037/pspa0000450
PMID40310217
OpenAlexW4410003398
LanguageIT
Citations received6

people's self-confidence in their own relevant creative abilities. This effect emerges for jokes, stories, poetry, and visual art, and it can consequently increase people's willingness to attempt the activity-even though the greater confidence underscoring their actions might be unwarranted. We further show that these effects emerge because gen-AI is perceived as a lower social referent for creative endeavors, bolstering people's own self-perceptions. As a result, for domains in which gen-AI is perceived as an equal or greater social referent (i.e., in fact-based domains), the effects are attenuated. These findings have significant implications for understanding human-AI interactions, antecedents for creative self-confidence, and the known referents that people use for social comparison effects. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)

Generative grammar · Referent · Self-confidence · AI in Service Interactions · Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science · Ethics and Social Impacts of AI · Psychology · Social Psychology

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