Through the Looking-Glass: AI-Mediated Video Communication Reduces Interpersonal Trust and Confidence in Judgments

2026-03-19

AI Summary

It remains unclear whether AI-mediated video communication affects the ability to detect deception. This study addresses this gap through two preregistered online experiments (N = 2000) that systematically examine how real-time AI-based video enhancements—such as beauty filters, background replacement, and virtual avatars—influence interpersonal trust, judgment confidence, and lie detection accuracy. The findings reveal that AI mediation significantly reduces perceived trustworthiness and confidence in judgments, particularly when virtual avatars are employed, yet it does not impair actual lie detection accuracy nor heighten suspicion toward users. These results challenge traditional theories of deception detection that rely heavily on nonverbal cues, demonstrating that while AI mediation alters social perception, it leaves core cognitive judgment capabilities intact.

Technology Category

• Humans and AI: Voting
• Philosophy and Ethics of AI: Safety, Robustness & Trustworthiness
• Natural Language Processing: Fact-Checking / Misinformation Detection (NLP Focus)

Application Category

• Economics, Online Markets and Human Computation: Trust and reliance of crowd workers and data experts on GenAI
• Responsible Web: Human-perceived consequences of algorithmic deployment on the web
• Social Networks and Social Media: Generative AI / large language models and their impact on social systems

Abstract

AI-based tools that mediate, enhance or generate parts of video communication may interfere with how people evaluate trustworthiness and credibility. In two preregistered online experiments (N = 2,000), we examined whether AI-mediated video retouching, background replacement and avatars affect interpersonal trust, people's ability to detect lies and confidence in their judgments. Participants watched short videos of speakers making truthful or deceptive statements across three conditions with varying levels of AI mediation. We observed that perceived trust and confidence in judgments declined in AI-mediated videos, particularly in settings in which some participants used avatars while others did not. However, participants' actual judgment accuracy remained unchanged, and they were no more inclined to suspect those using AI tools of lying. Our findings provide evidence against concerns that AI mediation undermines people's ability to distinguish truth from lies, and against cue-based accounts of lie detection more generally. They highlight the importance of trustworthy AI mediation tools in contexts where not only truth, but also trust and confidence matter.

Problem

• AI-mediated communication
• interpersonal trust
• lie detection
• judgment confidence
• video avatars

Innovation

• AI-mediated communication
• interpersonal trust
• lie detection
• avatar
• judgment confidence