Artificial Intelligence in Crisis Communication: Investigating Source Effects and Matched Crisis Responses on Stakeholder Perceptions

As public relations efforts increasingly integrate AI into operations, examining how the disclosure of AI as the source in organizational crisis communications affects public perceptions is increasingly relevant. This research investigates the effects of AI disclosure across matched crisis responses within a 3 (match crisis response: victim crisis-scapegoating, accidental crisis-excuse, preventable crisis-apology) x 2 (source disclosure: AI vs. human) experimental design survey. Key findings reveal that crisis responses with human sources, compared to those with AI disclosure, led to greater perceptions of organizational reputation and credibility across the three matched crisis responses. AI-disclosed messages from the company were also associated with increased perceptions of injustice, potentially due to concerns over fairness and authenticity. No significant interaction was detected between crisis response type and source disclosure, suggesting that they have independent effects on stakeholder perceptions. Trust in AI showed a small but statistically significant interaction with source disclosure within AI conditions for reputation, where higher trust slightly reduced the negative effects of AI disclosure. Practically, these findings suggest PR professionals should prioritize crisis communication with human sources while considering ongoing perceptions of trust in AI.