Scholarship: “Examining proposed generative AI integrations in public relations: Offering participatory (AI) public relations”

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Drew Ashby-King and I published the first article from our ongoing research about Artificial Intelligence and Public Relations in Public Relations Inquiry at the beginning of 2025. We continue to recruit participants for the funded part of this research study, which will interview social change communicators about their use of AI. This project sets some of the conceptual stakes for our future work.

In this project, we reviewed 63 blog posts and news articles from thought leaders, bloggers, and scholars who proposed integrating GenAI into public relations practice following the public release of ChatGPT. What we found is that much of the focus was on efficiency and productivity, with less emphasis on the ethical implications of delegating relational work to machines.

Drew and I argue that “dominant guidance ultimately suggested that GenAI could solve the problem of having to engage with and understand the nuanced perspectives of varying publics and communicating with them toward co-created meaning.” In this technochauvinist model, “public relations becomes a product rather than a process, an outcome rather than an ongoing commitment to communication and dialogue.”

As a corrective, we suggest Participatory (AI) Public Relations—P(AI)PR, for short. (See what we did there?) P(AI)PR centers participation in relationship-building in PR practice—to “ensure that human connection and relationships are at the center of public relations practice.” This means prioritizing human-to-human relationships, using AI to supplement rather than replace human writers, and continuously evaluating ethical concerns as we adopt these new tools. 

You can read the entire article from Public Relations Inquiry, or email me if you need access to a PDF copy.

Abstract:

This study explores the instructional guidance provided to public relations practitioners on utilizing Generative AI (GenAI) following the public release of ChatGPT. We took a critical public relations approach to examine how thought leaders, bloggers, and scholars proposed integrating GenAI into public relations practice. Through a critical thematic analysis of 63 blog posts and news articles we sought to understand how instructional guides suggested integrating GenAI tools and the potential implications of these suggestions. We found that the examined texts primarily focused on how GenAI could enhance practitioners’ efficiency, paying limited attention to the possible ethical implications of delegating public relations work to machines. We highlight potential ethical issues associated with GenAI taking over a significant portion of the writing tasks in public relations, and we argue that PR needs to develop alternative ways to utilize GenAI while preserving the unique contributions of human practitioners. We introduce the concept of participatory (AI) public relations, which emphasizes an ontological shift in how public relations understands and uses AI, where outcome is less important than the act of engaging in the practice of public relations.