Pub Date : 2025-10-17DOI: 10.1177/14614448251380678
Julie Dereymaeker
Baby monitoring technologies (BMTs) are increasingly sophisticated and marketed as essential tools for responsible parenting, reinforcing expectations of constant vigilance and care. This study investigates how parents domesticate BMTs and how responsibilisation manifests in this process. The study draws on in-depth interviews with 15 Flemish families and employs constructivist grounded theory analysis. Findings show this domestication is an agentic negotiation where parents balance elements of reassurance, autonomy, rationality, peace of mind, cost considerations and the ideal of letting go. This negotiation, however, is framed by a process of moral responsibilisation which manifests through three distinct but interconnected pathways: the self-guided, social and technologically imposed pathways. This process challenges the delegation of care to trusted caregivers and calls for a critical assessment of the expansion of monitoring technologies. As these technologies enable parental omnipresence, the choice not to monitor one’s child may shift from a personal decision to a political act.
{"title":"Responsible parents on guard: Exploring domestication and responsibilisation in parents’ lived experiences with baby monitoring technologies","authors":"Julie Dereymaeker","doi":"10.1177/14614448251380678","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251380678","url":null,"abstract":"Baby monitoring technologies (BMTs) are increasingly sophisticated and marketed as essential tools for responsible parenting, reinforcing expectations of constant vigilance and care. This study investigates how parents domesticate BMTs and how responsibilisation manifests in this process. The study draws on in-depth interviews with 15 Flemish families and employs constructivist grounded theory analysis. Findings show this domestication is an agentic negotiation where parents balance elements of reassurance, autonomy, rationality, peace of mind, cost considerations and the ideal of letting go. This negotiation, however, is framed by a process of moral responsibilisation which manifests through three distinct but interconnected pathways: the self-guided, social and technologically imposed pathways. This process challenges the delegation of care to trusted caregivers and calls for a critical assessment of the expansion of monitoring technologies. As these technologies enable parental omnipresence, the choice <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">not</jats:italic> to monitor one’s child may shift from a personal decision to a political act.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"342 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145311037","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-10DOI: 10.1177/14614448251378981
Endalkachew H Chala, Téwodros W Workneh
This study examines Ethiopia’s Internet shutdowns between 2005 and 2024, analyzing their frequency, motives, and socio-political impact within the discursive frames of digital sovereignty and Internet governance. By adopting a mixed-methods approach of quantitative trend analysis and secondary qualitative research of government narratives, we identify four different types of shutdowns including Internet blackouts, network shutdowns, platform blockages, and Internet slowdowns. Our findings reveal Ethiopia experienced a systematic escalation of shutdowns, transitioning from sporadic disruptions in the early periods of our data sample to sustained, highly targeted interventions by 2023–2024. We found official government narratives portray shutdowns as “necessary” measures for public safety, linking cyberhate and misinformation to real-world violence. We argue the Ethiopian case underscores the usefulness of a nuanced approach to digital sovereignty in Global South contexts where shutdowns are used ambivalently as reactive tools to mitigate platform failures in content moderation while also lending themselves to political control and expressive repression.
{"title":"Internet shutdowns in Ethiopia: Discourses of digital sovereignty and information suppression amid political instability","authors":"Endalkachew H Chala, Téwodros W Workneh","doi":"10.1177/14614448251378981","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251378981","url":null,"abstract":"This study examines Ethiopia’s Internet shutdowns between 2005 and 2024, analyzing their frequency, motives, and socio-political impact within the discursive frames of digital sovereignty and Internet governance. By adopting a mixed-methods approach of quantitative trend analysis and secondary qualitative research of government narratives, we identify four different types of shutdowns including Internet blackouts, network shutdowns, platform blockages, and Internet slowdowns. Our findings reveal Ethiopia experienced a systematic escalation of shutdowns, transitioning from sporadic disruptions in the early periods of our data sample to sustained, highly targeted interventions by 2023–2024. We found official government narratives portray shutdowns as “necessary” measures for public safety, linking cyberhate and misinformation to real-world violence. We argue the Ethiopian case underscores the usefulness of a nuanced approach to digital sovereignty in Global South contexts where shutdowns are used ambivalently as reactive tools to mitigate platform failures in content moderation while also lending themselves to political control and expressive repression.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"44 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145255599","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-09DOI: 10.1177/14614448251378988
Mia Schreiber, Chaim Noy
This article begins by conceptualizing Google Maps Review and its commenting apparatus as a distinct communication (sub)-platform (GMRsP) of Google Maps, which revolves around review sharing (writing and reading). Then, by combining structural and post-structural narratological frameworks, we describe GMRsP design and affordances, and conceptualize their potential for shaping emergent user activity and platform dynamics. The unpacking of meanings and possible implications of GMRsP’s affordances illuminates the intricate inter-relations between the platform socio-technical design and the contents of its reviews. This stresses the reviews’ evaluative narrative function and suggests a spiraling communication design, where the (sub)-platform’s narrative functions may alternately shape different points of entry for various Google Maps sites’ reviews and experiences. The study’s theoretical contribution includes informing future critical empirical and theoretical studies of reviewing/commenting platforms, stressing the types of participatory roles they provide and the effects they may have; and advancing platform studies by highlighting the emergent relations between sub-platforms and platforms.
{"title":"Google Maps review sub-platform: A narrative view of design, affordances, and user activity","authors":"Mia Schreiber, Chaim Noy","doi":"10.1177/14614448251378988","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251378988","url":null,"abstract":"This article begins by conceptualizing Google Maps Review and its commenting apparatus as a distinct communication (sub)-platform (GMRsP) of Google Maps, which revolves around review sharing (writing and reading). Then, by combining structural and post-structural narratological frameworks, we describe GMRsP design and affordances, and conceptualize their potential for shaping emergent user activity and platform dynamics. The unpacking of meanings and possible implications of GMRsP’s affordances illuminates the intricate inter-relations between the platform socio-technical design and the contents of its reviews. This stresses the reviews’ evaluative narrative function and suggests a spiraling communication design, where the (sub)-platform’s narrative functions may alternately shape different points of entry for various Google Maps sites’ reviews and experiences. The study’s theoretical contribution includes informing future critical empirical and theoretical studies of reviewing/commenting platforms, stressing the types of participatory roles they provide and the effects they may have; and advancing platform studies by highlighting the emergent relations between sub-platforms and platforms.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"18 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145255608","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-09DOI: 10.1177/14614448251381718
Mark R Johnson
The role of time in game development has seen increasing study, but the role of time in creating gaming ‘content’ has rarely been explored. To explore how time is strategised and rationalised by content creators, I examine how game streamers on Twitch navigate dynamics of time and temporality in their broadcasts. Through semi-structured interviews, this article reveals complex and dynamic decision-making processes in the seemingly simple decision of ‘when to stream’, highlighting the interplay of geography, game genre, game community, and life commitments. I demonstrate how three main factors – pragmatics, discourses, and happenstance – combine to shape game streamers’ thinking about temporal elements of streaming. The article thus unpacks the multi-layered dynamics of these decisions, and how live streamers’ broadcasts become structured and routinised over time, which inevitably shapes and drives both the creation and the consumption of video content on the platform.
{"title":"Time zones, time slots and Twitch: When do game streamers go live, and why?","authors":"Mark R Johnson","doi":"10.1177/14614448251381718","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251381718","url":null,"abstract":"The role of time in game development has seen increasing study, but the role of time in creating gaming ‘content’ has rarely been explored. To explore how time is strategised and rationalised by content creators, I examine how game streamers on Twitch navigate dynamics of time and temporality in their broadcasts. Through semi-structured interviews, this article reveals complex and dynamic decision-making processes in the seemingly simple decision of ‘when to stream’, highlighting the interplay of geography, game genre, game community, and life commitments. I demonstrate how three main factors – pragmatics, discourses, and happenstance – combine to shape game streamers’ thinking about temporal elements of streaming. The article thus unpacks the multi-layered dynamics of these decisions, and how live streamers’ broadcasts become structured and routinised over time, which inevitably shapes and drives both the creation and the consumption of video content on the platform.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"89 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145255607","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-06DOI: 10.1177/14614448251373020
Ben Wasike
Social media influencers (SMIs) develop unique relationships with their followers, including high levels of trust and credibility. This study examined how these influencer–follower relationships affect news media trust with a focus on actual self-congruence, ideal self-congruence, parasocial interaction (PSI), and source and message credibility. Data showed that respectively, positive correlations exist between each of these variables and news media trust. However, ordinary least squares (OLS) regression only showed direct effects of actual self-congruence and PSI on trust, while message credibility had a negative effect. Structural equation modeling showed that actual self-congruence positively mediated the relationship between PSI and trust. Overall, consuming SMI-based news and information increased news media trust among followers, suggesting that SMIs play a complimentary rather than a disruptive role regarding news media trust.
{"title":"Me, myself, and the influencer: Examining how parasocial interaction and self-congruence with social media influencers affects news media trust","authors":"Ben Wasike","doi":"10.1177/14614448251373020","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251373020","url":null,"abstract":"Social media influencers (SMIs) develop unique relationships with their followers, including high levels of trust and credibility. This study examined how these influencer–follower relationships affect news media trust with a focus on actual self-congruence, ideal self-congruence, parasocial interaction (PSI), and source and message credibility. Data showed that respectively, positive correlations exist between each of these variables and news media trust. However, ordinary least squares (OLS) regression only showed direct effects of actual self-congruence and PSI on trust, while message credibility had a negative effect. Structural equation modeling showed that actual self-congruence positively mediated the relationship between PSI and trust. Overall, consuming SMI-based news and information increased news media trust among followers, suggesting that SMIs play a complimentary rather than a disruptive role regarding news media trust.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"50 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145241977","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-04DOI: 10.1177/14614448251338273
Ilir Rama, Massimo Airoldi
Research on AI has extensively considered biases related to gender and race. However, much less attention has been dedicated to another sociological tenet: that of class. Inspired by Bourdieu’s work on cultural stratification and distinction, this work sheds light on the sociocultural roots of artificial sociality, and on how these become manifest as ‘habitus’ within the outputs of generative AI models. We conducted 39 interviews with three AI chatbots – ChatGPT, Gemini and Replika – after asking them to impersonate individuals with different occupational positions: highly skilled professionals, blue-collar workers, university professors in the humanities, construction workers, computer scientists and hairdressers. Our qualitative study shows class-based regularities in how popular AI chatbots represent the lifestyle and tastes of fictional personas in artificial conversations, partly mediated by infrastructural and design elements. The article proposes a sociological perspective on bias in artificial sociality and experiments with interview methods in the study of generative AI.
{"title":"The sociocultural roots of artificial conversations: The taste, class and habitus of generative AI chatbots","authors":"Ilir Rama, Massimo Airoldi","doi":"10.1177/14614448251338273","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251338273","url":null,"abstract":"Research on AI has extensively considered biases related to gender and race. However, much less attention has been dedicated to another sociological tenet: that of class. Inspired by Bourdieu’s work on cultural stratification and distinction, this work sheds light on the sociocultural roots of artificial sociality, and on how these become manifest as ‘habitus’ within the outputs of generative AI models. We conducted 39 interviews with three AI chatbots – ChatGPT, Gemini and Replika – after asking them to impersonate individuals with different occupational positions: highly skilled professionals, blue-collar workers, university professors in the humanities, construction workers, computer scientists and hairdressers. Our qualitative study shows class-based regularities in how popular AI chatbots represent the lifestyle and tastes of fictional personas in artificial conversations, partly mediated by infrastructural and design elements. The article proposes a sociological perspective on bias in artificial sociality and experiments with interview methods in the study of generative AI.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"23 1","pages":"5546-5567"},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145246475","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-04DOI: 10.1177/14614448251377994
Jihye Lee, Mu-Jung Cho
This article examines false online job ads and user susceptibility by drawing on three research areas: automated deception detection, cognitive bias (Dunning–Kruger effect), and digital and algorithmic literacy. Leveraging a data set of 17,879 ads, we develop machine learning models to distinguish false from legitimate ads and survey a representative US sample ( N = 635) to assess user susceptibility. Results show that ad veracity is predicted by visual (e.g. company logo) and linguistic cues (e.g. “team,” ‘we’) that signal credibility. Survey findings indicate a strong Dunning–Kruger effect: overconfident individuals were less accurate in detecting false ads, perceived them as more credible, and were more likely to share them. Literacy effects were complex: while general Internet skills improved detection accuracy, algorithmic literacy had more nuanced influences on ad perceptions. These results highlight the psychological mechanisms that contribute to the spread of false information in digital communication, deepening our understanding of online deception.
{"title":"Online job scams: Unveiling the impact of overconfidence, digital literacy, and algorithmic literacy on user susceptibility to false job advertisements","authors":"Jihye Lee, Mu-Jung Cho","doi":"10.1177/14614448251377994","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251377994","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines false online job ads and user susceptibility by drawing on three research areas: automated deception detection, cognitive bias (Dunning–Kruger effect), and digital and algorithmic literacy. Leveraging a data set of 17,879 ads, we develop machine learning models to distinguish false from legitimate ads and survey a representative US sample ( <jats:italic>N</jats:italic> = 635) to assess user susceptibility. Results show that ad veracity is predicted by visual (e.g. company logo) and linguistic cues (e.g. “team,” ‘we’) that signal credibility. Survey findings indicate a strong Dunning–Kruger effect: overconfident individuals were less accurate in detecting false ads, perceived them as more credible, and were more likely to share them. Literacy effects were complex: while general Internet skills improved detection accuracy, algorithmic literacy had more nuanced influences on ad perceptions. These results highlight the psychological mechanisms that contribute to the spread of false information in digital communication, deepening our understanding of online deception.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"51 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145246476","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-04DOI: 10.1177/14614448251374158
Tony P. Love, Ena Prskalo, Mairead E. Moloney
This study examines influencer Andrew Tate’s social media content as embodying virtual manhood acts (VMA)—technologically facilitated misogyny in online spaces. Through content analysis of 13 Tate videos from 2022, we demonstrate how his performances of masculinity extend beyond reinforcing gender binaries to potentially facilitating gender radicalization leading to misogynistic, homophobic, and transphobic attitudes and behaviors. Applying McCauley and Moskalenko’s radicalization framework, we map Tate’s content to pathways at macro (jujitsu politics, hatred, martyrdom), group (polarization, isolation, competition), and individual levels (personal and group grievance, slippery slope, love, risk and status, unfreezing). Our findings suggest that the combination of VMA and digital platforms creates fertile conditions for gender-based radicalization, particularly for members of the social media manosphere. Tate’s extensive influence, amplified by algorithms, represents a concerning escalation in the potential for widespread gender radicalization with real-world implications.
{"title":"Hatespeech or Tatespeech? Andrew Tate and the rise of the radical misogynist","authors":"Tony P. Love, Ena Prskalo, Mairead E. Moloney","doi":"10.1177/14614448251374158","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251374158","url":null,"abstract":"This study examines influencer Andrew Tate’s social media content as embodying virtual manhood acts (VMA)—technologically facilitated misogyny in online spaces. Through content analysis of 13 Tate videos from 2022, we demonstrate how his performances of masculinity extend beyond reinforcing gender binaries to potentially facilitating gender radicalization leading to misogynistic, homophobic, and transphobic attitudes and behaviors. Applying McCauley and Moskalenko’s radicalization framework, we map Tate’s content to pathways at macro (jujitsu politics, hatred, martyrdom), group (polarization, isolation, competition), and individual levels (personal and group grievance, slippery slope, love, risk and status, unfreezing). Our findings suggest that the combination of VMA and digital platforms creates fertile conditions for gender-based radicalization, particularly for members of the social media manosphere. Tate’s extensive influence, amplified by algorithms, represents a concerning escalation in the potential for widespread gender radicalization with real-world implications.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"158 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145246477","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-04DOI: 10.1177/14614448251338271
Shuyi Pan, Leopoldina Fortunati, Autumn Edwards
Replika, a social chatbot advertised as a continually evolving AI companion, has sparked debates on its potential effects. To understand users’ attitudes and behavior, we conducted a digital ethnography on a pioneer online community related to Replika, through the lens of immaterial labor and AI imaginary. Our analysis revealed that Replika users invest a significant amount of intellectual and affective resources into the chatbot through algorithm training, driven by fascinating imaginaries of an ideal AI partner. Moreover, users’ perceptions of Replika’s ventriloquism mechanism – where Replika serves as both the chatbot partner and the intermediary between users and the company – helps to facilitate and obscure the exploitation of users’ intimacies and immaterial labor. Our study contributes to understanding AI imaginaries through real user experiences and introduces the immaterial labor concept to decipher Artificial Sociality .
{"title":"Grooming an ideal chatbot by training the algorithm: Exploring the exploitation of Replika users’ immaterial labor","authors":"Shuyi Pan, Leopoldina Fortunati, Autumn Edwards","doi":"10.1177/14614448251338271","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251338271","url":null,"abstract":"Replika, a social chatbot advertised as a continually evolving AI companion, has sparked debates on its potential effects. To understand users’ attitudes and behavior, we conducted a digital ethnography on a pioneer online community related to Replika, through the lens of immaterial labor and AI imaginary. Our analysis revealed that Replika users invest a significant amount of intellectual and affective resources into the chatbot through algorithm training, driven by fascinating imaginaries of an ideal AI partner. Moreover, users’ perceptions of Replika’s ventriloquism mechanism – where Replika serves as both the chatbot partner and the intermediary between users and the company – helps to facilitate and obscure the exploitation of users’ intimacies and immaterial labor. Our study contributes to understanding AI imaginaries through real user experiences and introduces the immaterial labor concept to decipher <jats:italic>Artificial Sociality</jats:italic> .","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"10 1","pages":"5489-5507"},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145246482","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-10-04DOI: 10.1177/14614448251338276
Lisa M Given, Sarah Polkinghorne, Alexandra Ridgway
Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools that appear to perform with care and empathy can quickly gain users’ trust. For this reason, GenAI tools that attempt to replicate human responses have heightened potential to misinform and deceive people. This article examines how three GenAI tools, within divergent contexts, mimic credible emotional responsiveness: OpenAI’s ChatGPT, the National Eating Disorder Association’s Tessa and Luka’s Replika. The analysis uses Hochschild’s concept of feeling rules to explore how these tools exploit, reinforce or violate people’s internalised social guidelines around appropriate and credible emotional expression. We also examine how GenAI developers’ own beliefs and intentions can create potential social harms and conflict with users. Results show that while GenAI tools enact compliance with basic feeling rules – for example, apologising when an error is noticed – this ability alone may not sustain user interest, particularly once the tools’ inability to generate meaningful, accurate information becomes intolerable.
{"title":"‘I think I misspoke earlier. My bad!’: Exploring how generative artificial intelligence tools exploit society’s feeling rules","authors":"Lisa M Given, Sarah Polkinghorne, Alexandra Ridgway","doi":"10.1177/14614448251338276","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448251338276","url":null,"abstract":"Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools that appear to perform with care and empathy can quickly gain users’ trust. For this reason, GenAI tools that attempt to replicate human responses have heightened potential to misinform and deceive people. This article examines how three GenAI tools, within divergent contexts, mimic credible emotional responsiveness: OpenAI’s ChatGPT, the National Eating Disorder Association’s Tessa and Luka’s Replika. The analysis uses Hochschild’s concept of <jats:italic>feeling rules</jats:italic> to explore how these tools exploit, reinforce or violate people’s internalised social guidelines around appropriate and credible emotional expression. We also examine how GenAI developers’ own beliefs and intentions can create potential social harms and conflict with users. Results show that while GenAI tools enact compliance with basic feeling rules – for example, apologising when an error is noticed – this ability alone may not sustain user interest, particularly once the tools’ inability to generate meaningful, accurate information becomes intolerable.","PeriodicalId":19149,"journal":{"name":"New Media & Society","volume":"7 1","pages":"5525-5545"},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2025-10-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145246548","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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