Human vs. AI Facilitation in Peer Support Groups: an Experimental Study on Exam Anxiety

Document Type

Article

Source of Publication

Journal of Technology in Behavioral Science

Publication Date

4-10-2026

Abstract

In some nations, there is a rising, and frequently unmet, demand for access to mental health services. The provision of peer support and group-based therapies has been one way to help address this growing demand. Increasingly, the use of AI chatbots is being explored as a potential solution. This study investigates the concept of a polyadic chatbot moderating human-to-human peer support discussions in the context of exam anxiety. Specifically, the study compared the impact of AI versus human facilitators on emotional connection, perceived facilitation effectiveness, perceived utility, and usage intention. A total of 112 participants were involved: 58 engaged in an AI-facilitated discussion, and 54 engaged in a human-facilitated discussion. The findings suggest that human-facilitated peer support outperformed AI-facilitated experiences across all key measures. However, the AI facilitator did not perform so poorly as to be disregarded. Additionally, a path analysis conducted across the entire sample revealed that perceived emotional connection and facilitation effectiveness were significant predictors of perceived utility. In turn, perceived utility strongly influenced participants’ intention to engage with the peer-support discussion platform. These findings highlight how improving emotional connection and facilitation effectiveness could foster the adoption of peer-support tools, with AI facilitators holding promise as a valuable adjunct to current mental health service provision on college campuses.

ISSN

2366-5963

Publisher

Springer Science and Business Media LLC

Disciplines

Computer Sciences | Education

Keywords

AI, Exam anxiety, Peer support, Polyadic chatbot

Scopus ID

105035418675

Indexed in Scopus

yes

Open Access

no

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