The Impact of Generative AI Characteristics on Users' Experiential Value and Product Involvement

ABSTRACT Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) marks the transition from weak to strong AI, offering transformative potential to enhance operational efficiency and user experience. However, empirical research remains limited on how GenAI's characteristics shape user experience and involvement, which critically hinders firms from aligning technical investments with psychologically grounded user needs. To address this gap, this study draws on experiential value theory to develop a product involvement model for GenAI, examining how GenAI characteristics influence extrinsic and intrinsic value as well as product involvement. Structural equation modeling of web‐based survey data reveals that GenAI characteristics enhance users' extrinsic value (driven by perceived responsiveness, creativity, interactivity, and empathy) and intrinsic value (influenced by perceived responsiveness, interactivity, and empathy), thereby positively affecting product involvement. Moreover, the need for cognitive closure positively moderates the relationship between experiential value and product involvement. Theoretically, this study proposes a dual‐path model linking GenAI's characteristics to user experience and involvement through extrinsic and intrinsic value, offering empirical support to deepen understanding of product involvement in the GenAI context. Practically, it provides actionable insights for GenAI design and cognitive‐profile‐based market segmentation.