Negative Perceptions of Outsourcing to Artificial Intelligence

As artificial intelligence (AI) tools become increasingly integrated into daily life, people are beginning to outsource not only professional tasks but also socio-relational ones. Large language models like ChatGPT can generate wedding vows, speeches, and personal messages, raising questions about how individuals who use AI for such tasks are perceived by others. In this paper, we conduct five pre-registered studies with British participants (N = 3,649) to understand how people view those who outsource tasks to AI, and how this depends on how socio-relational the task is, whether AI is used as a tool or fully delegated to, and the acknowledgment of the AI use. We find negative perceptions of outsourcing, particularly for socio-relational tasks. We show that outsourcing makes us think more negatively about not only the person and their motivations, but also the outsourced work itself. Moreover, we provide insight into why this occurs: the reduced effort from outsourcing socio-relational tasks to AI signals that the output is less authentically one’s own and that the person cares less about the task. Our research highlights the way that AI use shapes our perceptions of people, raising key philosophical questions about efficiency, authenticity, and social ties in a world filled with AI-mediated interactions.