Beyond the threat to livelihoods, AI’s ability to craft compelling, humanlike stories also poses a societal risk: the spread of misinformation. Fake news, which once required significant effort, can nOW be produced with ease. This is especially concerning because decades of research have shown that people are often more influenced by stories than by explicit arguments and entreaties.

We set out to study how well AI-written stories stack up against those by human storytellers. We found that AI storytelling is impressive, but professional writers needn’t worry – at least not yet.