People put a value on human connection, even when AI communicates in the same way

Human-attributed responses are perceived as more supportive, emotionally resonant, and caring than identically AI-generated responses, according to a new study by Hebrew University of Jerusalem researchers. Published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour, the study involved over 6,000 participants in nine different experiments in which chatbot responses were crafted by large language models (LLMs). The research reveals that human-attributed responses are perceived as more supportive, more emotionally resonant, and more caring than identical AI-generated responses.

“It’s becoming second nature to run our emails or messages through AI,” said Prof. Perry of the Hebrew University Department of Psychology. “But our findings suggest a hidden cost: the more we rely on AI, the more our words risk feeling hollow. As people begin to assume that every message is AI-generated, the perceived sincerity, and with it, the emotional connection, may begin to disappear. AI may help scale support systems but in moments that require deep emotional connection, people still want the human touch.”

The preference was especially strong for responses that emphasised emotional sharing and genuine care—the affective and motivational components of empathy—rather than just cognitive understanding. In fact, participants were even willing to wait days or weeks to receive a response from a human rather than get an immediate reply from a chatbot.

Interestingly, when participants believed an AI may have helped generate or edit a response they thought was from a human, their positive feelings diminished significantly. This suggests that perceived authenticity—believing that someone genuinely invested time and emotional effort—plays a critical role in how we experience empathy.

The researchers say that the study offers key insights into the psychology of empathy and raises timely questions about how society will integrate emotionally intelligent AI into our daily lives. The research paper titled “Comparing the Value of Perceived Human versus AI-Generated Empathy” is now available in Nature Human Behaviour.