Paper Type
Short
Paper Number
PACIS2025-1854
Description
It is common that consumers may refer to product recommendations on social networking sites before making a purchase. With the advent of AI, consumers also start to consult AI for product recommendations. This study thus explores how consumers perceive product recommendations from AI and social networking sites, and how these perceptions further influence consumers’ attitudes towards the recommended product and brand. In a 2x2 online experiment (N=233), we find that well-known brand product recommendations from social networks (i.e., Reddit) were perceived to be more credible than the same well-known brand product recommendations from AI (i.e., ChatGPT), and niche brand product recommendations from social networks (i.e., Reddit). Contributions to theory and practice are discussed.
Recommended Citation
Gao, Yuting and Miao, Xiaoyu, "Consumer Perceptions of Product Recommendations: The Role of AI and Social Networks" (2025). PACIS 2025 Proceedings. 21.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/pacis2025/hci/hci/21
Consumer Perceptions of Product Recommendations: The Role of AI and Social Networks
It is common that consumers may refer to product recommendations on social networking sites before making a purchase. With the advent of AI, consumers also start to consult AI for product recommendations. This study thus explores how consumers perceive product recommendations from AI and social networking sites, and how these perceptions further influence consumers’ attitudes towards the recommended product and brand. In a 2x2 online experiment (N=233), we find that well-known brand product recommendations from social networks (i.e., Reddit) were perceived to be more credible than the same well-known brand product recommendations from AI (i.e., ChatGPT), and niche brand product recommendations from social networks (i.e., Reddit). Contributions to theory and practice are discussed.
Comments
HCI