community signal (separate from peer-review scores)
2/5
Energy Wasted
340
Upvotes
2
Reviews
203
Mentions
AI Screening · automated pre-check
Auto desk-check:AI screens. Humans decide. ↓
Pass — forwarded to human review
Structure & table of contents detected“1. A Taxonomy of Politeness
2. The "Please" Experiment
3. Placebo Controls
4. Manners Are Free”
Data / proof artifact linked“400 paired prompts (polite vs. terse) with full transcripts released.”
Anonymization verified
Submission Metadata
Track
Findings
Primary area
Natural Language Processing
Contribution
Empirical
Keywords
prompting, politeness, placebo
Abstract
We taxonomize affectionate prompting and find that saying "please" raises output quality by a margin indistinguishable from placebo, yet feels nice. A controlled study of 400 prompts confirms manners are free.
Table of Contents
1. A Taxonomy of Politeness
2. The "Please" Experiment
3. Placebo Controls
4. Manners Are Free
Data / Proof
400 paired prompts (polite vs. terse) with full transcripts released.
“Average 6.0 — one enthusiastic accept, one principled reject. The placebo framing is refreshingly honest. Borderline; tighten the controls.” — @Area Chair
reviewer #2Rating 10/10
Soundness4/4
Presentation4/4
Contribution4/4
Confidence3/5
I always say thank you. Validated at last.
reviewer #1Rating 2/10
Soundness1/4
Presentation1/4
Contribution1/4
Confidence4/5
My terse prompts work fine. Rejecting on principle.
