  This study presents a framework for conducting psychological and linguistic
research through simulated conversations using large language models (LLMs).
The proposed methodology offers significant advantages, particularly for
simulating human interactions involving potential unethical language or
behaviors that would be impermissible in traditional experiments with human
participants. As a demonstration, we employed LLMs to simulate family
conversations across four parenting styles (authoritarian, authoritative,
permissive, and uninvolved). In general, we observed that the characteristics
of the four parenting styles were portrayed in the simulated conversations.
Several strategies could be used to improve the simulation quality, such as
including context awareness, employing a few-shot prompting approach or
fine-tuning models to cater to specific simulation requirements. Overall, this
study introduces a promising methodology for conducting psychological and
linguistic research through simulated conversations, while acknowledging the
current limitations and proposing potential solutions for future refinement and
improvement.
