Societal impacts of chatbot and mitigation strategies for negative impacts: A large-scale qualitative survey of ChatGPT users

Discussing ChatGPT's societal impact often focuses on specific domains or groups, typically involving a limited number of participants. In contrast, this study investigates the impact of this artificial intelligence (AI) on society as a whole by conducting a qualitative online survey with 1298 daily users from Hinterland of China across various industries. Identified key benefits include enhanced efficiency and production, improved communication, understand, and cooperation, increased social equalization and harmony, and bolstered public mental health. On the downside, concerns arose about (un)employment issues, biased or false outputs, potential for unethical applications, and user dependency and its negative consequences. To address these concerns, participants suggested use restrictions and management, promoting independent and critical thinking/practice, enhancing user literacy, increasing individual irreplaceability, technological improvement and optimization, and safeguarding against AI threats to human society. The above results elucidate the impact of ChatGPT on various social domains and potential solutions for its negative effects. These findings augment existing research on AI user models from a societal impact perspective, providing a foundation for proposing AI user models that consider the social implications of AI. These outcomes also aim to assist policymakers, researchers, and designers in better understanding the societal impact and user concerns regarding AI, thereby informing the design and enhancement of products, services, or policies. •Studying ChatGPT ‘s impact on society broadly, not just a specific area.•Beyond ChatGPT's pros/cons, this study also proposes remedy strategies.•Amassing wide real-user feedback, beyond limited users or direct GPT dialogue.•Offering a foundation for proposing AI user models considering AI's social effects.•Aiding policy makers and designers to grasp AI's societal impact and user issues.