Behaviour & Information Technology

The Bright and Dark sides of AI-Generated Content in the Digital Economy

Timeline: The special issue will be accepting submissions until July 31, 2026.

The digital economy is the driving force behind the current global economic growth and industrial transformation. Digital technologies have given rise to new industries and business models, they help connect various economic actors, promote the efficient allocation of resources, and create numerous new jobs and business opportunities (Cheng et al., 2025; Pan et al., 2022). The rapid development of artificial intelligence generated content (AIGC) has reshaped the operating model of the digital economy, significantly impacting enterprises, industries and digital platforms (Wessel et al., 2025; Shan & Qiu, 2025). Enterprises are widely deploying AIGC technology for intelligent marketing, customer service and data analytics, enhancing productivity while reducing labour and operational costs. Digital platforms use AIGC to optimize content distribution, reduce content creation costs, and increase user engagement. However, AIGC also poses potential risks and challenges to the digital economy. Certain industries are threatened by job displacement due to AIGC automation (Demirci et al., 2025). Over-reliance on AIGC can negatively impact critical thinking (Helal et al., 2025). Digital platforms struggle with issues such as the spread of misinformation, content bias and copyright infringement (Marabelli et al., 2025). Generative models are considered ‘black boxes’ that limit understanding of why outputs were generated. Ethical concerns such as data privacy breaches, IP infringement, and deepfakes have also emerged as critical concerns. Furthermore, the adoption of AIGC technology may deepen the digital divide between different regions and groups.

Researchers and practitioners are paying increasing attention to these dual impacts of AIGC on the digital economy. Studies of its positive effects can help to stimulate growth in the digital economy. Exploring its negative effects provides insights into ethical frameworks, bias mitigation, and risk prevention and control, helping regulators and digital platforms to address issues such as content regulation and copyright protection. Combining these two areas of research can promote the healthy and sustainable development of the digital economy in the AIGC era.

AIM

This special issue aims to present high-quality, original papers exploring the dual impact of AIGC on the digital economy. The issue will present innovative research and practical case studies that reveal the positive contributions and negative challenges of AIGC. We hope that this special issue will provide valuable insights for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers in related fields.

 

THEME

Possible topics include (but are not limited to):

 

- AIGC-driven innovation in digital economy

- How AIGC promotes digital development and economic growth

- Ethical frameworks for AIGC

- Human-AI interaction and augmented decision-making on digital platforms

- Applications of Human-AI collaboration in the platform economy

- Distinguishing AI and human work

- User interaction with AIGC on digital platforms

- Cases of AIGC application in digital platform and e-commerce

- Value co-creation and content production empowered by AIGC on digital platforms

- The impact of AIGC misinformation on user trust in the digital economy

- Impacts on the job market and labour transformation due to AIGC automation

- The ethical and privacy challenges of AIGC in the digital economy

- Regulatory frameworks and governance strategies for AIGC in digital economy

- Approaches to mitigating risks of AIGC in digital economy

- The impact of AIGC on the digital divide and equality

We invite researchers and practitioners from disciplines such as digital economy, artificial intelligence and information systems to submit original research articles, review articles and case studies for this special issue. Submissions should focus on the impact of AIGC on the digital economy and provide novel perspectives or practical solutions.

Reference

[1] Cheng, X., Jin, Y., Xu, Y, Luo, X., & Qiu, L. (2025). Revisiting seller reputation: Impact of internal and external reputation on sales in online knowledge payment markets. Production and Operations Management, 34(8), 2180-2198.

[2] Pan, W., Xie, T., Wang, Z., & Ma, L. (2022). Digital economy: An innovation driver for total factor productivity. Journal of Business Research, 139, 303-311

[3] Wessel, M., Adam, M., Benlian, A., Majchrzak, A., & Thies, F. (2025). Generative AI and its transformative value for digital platforms. Journal of Management Information Systems, 42(2), 346–369.

[4] Shan, G., & Qiu, L. (2025). Examining the impact of generative AI on users’ voluntary knowledge contribution: Evidence from a natural experiment on Stack Overflow. Information Systems Research. https://doi.org/10.1287/isre.2023.0332

[5] Demirci, O., Hannane, J., & Zhu, X. (2025). Who is AI replacing? The impact of generative AI on online freelancing platforms. Management Science, 71(10), 8097-8108.

[6] Marabelli, M., Newell, S., Ahuja, M., & Galliers, B. (2025). Are immersive platforms the future of work? The role of generative AI and DEI considerations. The Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 34(4), 101943.

[7] Helal, M. Y., Elgendy, I. A., Albashrawi, M. A., Dwivedi, Y. K., Al-Ahmadi, M. S., & Jeon, I. (2025). The impact of generative AI on critical thinking skills: a systematic review, conceptual framework and future research directions. Information Discovery and Delivery.