The Effects of Chatbot Gender on User Trust and Perception towards Shopping Chatbots

Abstract

This study investigates the influence of chatbot’s gender on user trust and perception toward shopping chatbots in social media marketing, to better understand whether people perceive chatbots differently just because of their gender cues on screen. A between-groups experiment was conducted, 120 participants were recruited to interact with one of the four chatbots: (1) chatbot with female profile image and female name; (2) chatbot with female profile image and unisex name; (3) chatbot with male profile image and male name; (4) chatbot with male profile image and unisex name. Afterwards, participants were requested to fill in a Likert scale questionnaire. Findings showed that chatbot gender did not have a statistically significant influence on user trust and perception towards chatbots in an online shopping context. However, subjects tended to rate chatbots of the opposite gender as more trustworthy than chatbots of same gender.

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Author Information
Hsiao-Chen You, National Taichung University of Science and Technology, Taiwan
Yi-Chieh Chen, National Taichung University of Science and Technology, Taiwan

• Category: Technology and Applied Sciences

Posted by James Alexander Gordon

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