Anthropomorphizing AI: A Multi-Label Analysis of Public Discourse on Social Media

Muhammad Owais Raza, Areej Fatemah Meghji


Abstract
As the anthropomorphization of AI in public discourse usually reflects a complex interplay of metaphors, media framing, and societal perceptions, it is increasingly being used to shape and influence public perception on a variety of topics. To explore public perception and investigate how AI is personified, emotionalized, and interpreted in public discourse, we develop a custom multi-labeled dataset from the title and description of YouTube videos discussing artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models (LLMs). This was accomplished using a hybrid annotation pipeline that combined human-in-the-loop validation with AI assisted pre-labeling. This research introduces a novel taxonomy of narrative and epistemic dimensions commonly found in social media content on AI / LLM. Employing two modeling techniques based on traditional machine learning and transformer-based models for classification, the experimental results indicate that the fine-tuned transformer models, particularly AnthroRoBERTa and AnthroDistilBERT, generally outperform traditional machine learning approaches in anthropomorphization focused classification.
Anthology ID:
2025.ommm-1.8
Volume:
Proceedings of Interdisciplinary Workshop on Observations of Misunderstood, Misguided and Malicious Use of Language Models
Month:
September
Year:
2025
Address:
Varna, Bulgaria
Editors:
Piotr Przybyła, Matthew Shardlow, Clara Colombatto, Nanna Inie
Venues:
OMMM | WS
SIG:
Publisher:
INCOMA Ltd., Shoumen, Bulgaria
Note:
Pages:
64–73
Language:
URL:
https://aclanthology.org/2025.ommm-1.8/
DOI:
Bibkey:
Cite (ACL):
Muhammad Owais Raza and Areej Fatemah Meghji. 2025. Anthropomorphizing AI: A Multi-Label Analysis of Public Discourse on Social Media. In Proceedings of Interdisciplinary Workshop on Observations of Misunderstood, Misguided and Malicious Use of Language Models, pages 64–73, Varna, Bulgaria. INCOMA Ltd., Shoumen, Bulgaria.
Cite (Informal):
Anthropomorphizing AI: A Multi-Label Analysis of Public Discourse on Social Media (Raza & Meghji, OMMM 2025)
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PDF:
https://aclanthology.org/2025.ommm-1.8.pdf