A Multimodal Analysis of Human Imitation of AI and Human–Machine Relations: A Case Study of 50 TikTok Videos

In recent years, the proliferation of illogical and “grotesque” AI-generated videos on social media has given rise to a cultural trend in which humans imitate AI in reverse. This form of mimicry, which takes AI characteristics as its creative source, has drawn increasing scholarly attention. This study conducts an empirical investigation into the phenomenon of human imitation of AI, analyzing 50 sample cases extracted from the Douyin platform. By applying Norris’s multimodal interaction analysis framework, the research further examines the multimodal characteristics of such content. The findings suggest that in the era of intelligent media, mimicry evolves into a phenomenon of multi-directional co-construction and symbiosis between humans and algorithms. While such videos share common multimodal features and serve primarily as meme-like cultural dissemination, they also reflect underlying anxieties about human–machine relations.