A survey from Gradient Labs, which builds AI customer support agents for banks and fintechs, finds most people alter their language once they realise they are talking to a machine, and Gen Z does it most. The company calls the habit "bot-switching", after code-switching.
Some 73% of Gen Z say they change how they speak once they know they are dealing with AI, compared with 68% of Millennials, 59% of Gen X and half of Boomers. Confidence in spotting a bot follows the same order: 82% of Gen Z say they can tell an AI agent from a person, against 52% of Boomers.
Once they have spotted one, 40% of Gen Z switch to simpler words, 20% get more demanding and 14% say things they would never say to a person.
Julia Alexeenko, a Gen Z culture analyst and lecturer at Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, compared the register to the way children speak to parents. "Gen Z feels comfortable commanding an AI agent around using very simplified language", she said, adding that AI agents are the only interlocutors with whom the generation does not feel pressured to perform socially.
To stay across the latest in cloud, AI and enterprise tech analysis from Compare the Cloud, subscribe to our weekly newsletter at https://www.comparethecloud.net/newsletter
