Emotion, Identity & Creativity 2025
This page summarises findings from the Human Clarity Institute’s Emotion, Identity & Creativity 2025 dataset, based on 507 valid responses across six English-speaking countries. The dataset examines how AI-assisted creative tools influence expression, meaning, originality, identity continuity, and the emotional experience of creative work.
Across the findings, one pattern appears repeatedly: clearer expression and stronger meaning do not always move together. Many respondents report that AI improves clarity and reduces friction in creative work, while simultaneously reporting weaker authorship, reduced emotional connection, or lower perceived meaning in what they create.
See the full system model:
Human Values in Practice: Coherence, Direction, and Human Functioning in Digitally Mediated Environments
View the Emotion, Identity & Creativity 2025 Dataset
What the data shows
Four behavioural patterns stand out in this dataset. First, AI-assisted tools are widely experienced as improving clarity of expression. Many respondents report that ideas feel easier to organise, communicate, and express when AI systems are involved.
Second, clearer expression does not always correspond with stronger meaning. Many respondents simultaneously report easier creative output while also reporting weaker emotional connection, reduced authorship, or lower perceived meaning in their work.
Third, AI-assisted creation appears capable of influencing identity continuity and self-perception. A substantial minority report that AI changes how they see their own abilities, creativity, or originality.
Finally, the dataset suggests that people are actively renegotiating what counts as meaningful, original, or personally authentic creative work within AI-assisted environments.
AI helps ideas come out more clearly
Respondents frequently report clearer or more fluid expression when AI tools are used.
Creative work can feel easier but less meaningful
AI-assisted creative work is often described as easier while simultaneously feeling less meaningful.
AI influences identity and self-perception
A substantial minority report that AI influences how they see themselves and their creative abilities.
Clarity gains and meaning reduction occur together
Respondents report experiencing both clearer expression and weaker meaning simultaneously.
Overall, the data suggest that AI-assisted creativity introduces a tension between external cognitive support and internally generated meaning. While AI can reduce friction and improve clarity, it may also alter the emotional, personal, and identity-related experience of creative work for some people.
By the numbers (from HCI data)
Clearer expression with AI assistance
Report that AI helps ideas feel clearer or easier to express.
Easier but less meaningful creative work
Report that AI-assisted work can feel easier while simultaneously feeling less meaningful.
Reduced originality concerns
Report that AI-assisted work can feel less original or personally distinctive.
Identity influence
Report that AI influences how they see themselves or their creative abilities.
Meaning of tasks is actively negotiated
Report that AI changes how meaningful certain creative or expressive tasks feel.
Clarity gains and meaning reduction occur together
Report simultaneously experiencing clearer expression and reduced meaning in AI-assisted creativity.
Patterns observed in the data
Clarity and meaning do not always move together
One of the strongest patterns in the dataset is the tension between clearer expression and perceived meaning. Many respondents report that AI helps organise thoughts and communicate ideas more clearly, yet this clarity does not always strengthen emotional connection or meaning.
This suggests that expressive ease and meaningful engagement may operate as partially separate experiences within AI-assisted creativity.
Easier expression can weaken perceived authorship
Respondents frequently describe AI-assisted work as easier to produce while also feeling less personally connected to the output. This suggests that reduced effort may sometimes weaken perceived ownership or authorship continuity.
The findings imply that meaning may depend partly on feeling personally involved in the creation process rather than only on the quality or clarity of the final output.
Identity and creativity are being renegotiated
A substantial minority report that AI influences how they see themselves, their abilities, or their originality. This suggests that AI-assisted creativity is not only changing workflows, but also influencing identity continuity and self-perception for some people.
The dataset repeatedly indicates that people are actively renegotiating what counts as authentic, original, or personally meaningful creative work.
Meaning and originality remain psychologically important
Even when AI improves clarity or efficiency, many respondents continue to value originality, personal ownership, and emotional connection within creative work.
This suggests that meaning in creativity may depend partly on preserving a sense of internally generated expression rather than only producing outcomes more efficiently.
External cognitive support creates a new expressive tension
The findings suggest that AI-assisted creativity creates a tension between external cognitive support and internally generated meaning. AI systems can genuinely reduce friction and improve expression while simultaneously altering the emotional or identity-related experience of creative work.
This tension does not support simplistic conclusions that AI creativity is inherently beneficial or harmful. Instead, it suggests that external cognitive support may reshape how meaning, authorship, and identity are experienced within creative processes.
Methodology
This dataset forms part of the Human Clarity Institute’s Human–AI Experience research programme, examining how AI tools influence emotional experience, identity perception, and creativity in everyday use. The study uses a cross-sectional online survey design and focuses on descriptive patterns in how people experience AI-assisted thinking, expression, and meaning-making.
Data were collected on 19 November 2025 via the Prolific research platform from adults across English-speaking countries. Participants provided explicit informed consent for anonymised data publication as part of HCI’s open research programme.
Sampling & participants
- Clean dataset: 507 valid responses
- Countries: United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland
- Eligibility: Fluent English
- Recruitment platform: Prolific
Participants were recruited using platform screening filters. The resulting dataset should be interpreted as a non-probability convenience sample and is not intended to represent national populations.
The cleaned dataset, variable dictionary, and reuse terms are publicly available through the HCI dataset repository: Emotion, Identity & Creativity in the Age of AI 2025 Dataset →