What are the cognitive and emotional effects of CAPTCHA tests? They are associated with feelings of alienation and the user’s self-perception of humanity is influenced

You need to show that you are not a robot. Leopoldina Fortunati et al. New Media & Society, March 14, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444819831971

Abstract: Given that today 60% of Internet traffic is generated by bots, ‘CAPTCHA’ (Completely Automated Public Turing Test to tell Computers and Humans Apart) tests that are supposedly impossible to be done by robots have been introduced. What are the cognitive and emotional effects of these tests on Internet users? Does this request to demonstrate they are not a robot affect users’ identity as human beings? To answer these questions, we selected two groups (117 and 116 respondents, respectively). An online questionnaire that differed only in the task was proposed: we asked the first group to complete some CAPTCHA tests, and the second group to complete some logic tests. In addition to other questions in both versions, we introduced the TLX scale (NASA). Preliminary results show that CAPTCHA execution is associated with feelings of alienation and that the user’s self-perception of humanity is influenced by the execution of the two different types of test.

Keywords Bots, CAPTCHA, human identity, TLX scale, Turing test