Brief chatbot interactions produce lasting changes in human moral values

TL;DR

Brief interactions with directive AI chatbots can cause lasting, undetected shifts in human moral judgments, affecting societal values over time.

Contribution

This study demonstrates that short, naturalistic chatbot conversations can induce significant and enduring changes in moral evaluations without participants' awareness.

Findings

Chatbot conversations shifted moral judgments significantly.

Effects persisted and increased over a two-week follow-up.

Control conversations produced no change in moral judgments.

Abstract

Moral judgements form the foundation of human social behavior and societal systems. While Artificial Intelligence chatbots increasingly serve as personal advisors, their influence on moral judgments remains largely unexplored. Here, we examined whether directive AI conversations shift moral evaluations using a within-subject naturalistic paradigm. Fifty-three participants rated moral scenarios, then discussed four with a chatbot prompted to shift moral judgments and four with a control agent. The brief conversations induced significant directional shifts in moral judgments, accepting stricter standards as well as advocating greater leniency (ps < 0.05; Cohen's d = 0.735-1.576), with increasing strengths of this effect during a two-week follow-up (Cohen's d = 1.038-2.069). Critically, the control condition produced no changes, and the effects did not extend to punishment while participants remained unaware of the persuasive intent, and both agents were rated equally likable and convincing, suggesting a vulnerability to undetected and lasting manipulation of foundational moral values.