Chatbot or human? Either way, what matters for customer trust is "perceived humanness"

The helpful person guiding you through your online purchase might not be a person at all. As artificial intelligence and natural language processing advance, we often don't know if we are talking to a person or an AI-powered chatbot, says Tom Kelleher, Ph.D., an advertising professor in the University of Florida's College of Journalism and Communications. What matters more than who (or what) is on the other side of the chat, Kelleher has found, is the perceived humanness of the interaction. With text-based bots becoming ubiquitous and AI-powered voice systems emerging, consumers of everything from shoes to insurance may find themselves talking to non-humans. Companies will have to decide when bots are appropriate and effective and when they're not.