this post was submitted on 06 Oct 2025
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AI chatbots that butter you up make you worse at conflict, study finds (www.theregister.com)
submitted 3 days ago by kalkulat@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
27 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

"Computer scientists from Stanford University and Carnegie Mellon University have evaluated 11 current machine learning models and found that all of them tend to tell people what they want to hear...."

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[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 12 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Why so polite?

My response would be:

That's wrong. Provide links to the docs for this.

[–] PumaStoleMyBluff@lemmy.world 13 points 2 days ago

Complete sentences for a bot is overkill

send docs, idiot

[–] ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml 8 points 2 days ago (2 children)

IIRC there was also a study or something done that said something to the effect of being rude to chatbots affects you outside of chatbots and carries into other parts of your work.

[–] Sturgist@lemmy.ca 8 points 2 days ago

Probably because everyone else is a poorly written chatbot

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Really? Is that the same for other inanimate objects like appliances? Or are people anthropomorphizing chatbots?

[–] ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 day ago (2 children)

I think it's because it's the idea if you're comfortable being rude to chatbots and you're used to typing rude things to chatbots, it makes it much easier for it to accidentally slip out during real conversations too. Something like that, not really as much as it being about anthropomorphizing anything.

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 day ago

Makes sense.

For what it's worth, I'm not suggesting anyone use rude language or anything, just be direct.

[–] mx_smith@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It’s really hard to say if it’s AI causing these feelings of rudeness, I have been getting more pessimistic about society for the last 10 years.

[–] ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml 1 points 15 hours ago

That's true, but I think the idea is if you're comfortable typing it, it's easier for it to accidentally slip out during professional chat whereas normally you'd be more reserved and careful with what you say.

[–] melfie@lemy.lol 6 points 2 days ago

Sometimes, I’m inclined to swear at it, but I try to be professional on work machines with the assumption I’m being monitored in one way or another. I’m planning to try some self-hosted models at some point and will happy use more colorful language in that case, especially if I can delete it should it become vengeful.