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Emotional Attachment to AI Companions and European Law
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Emerging evidence indicates that AI companion use can involve emotional attachment, over-reliance, self-disclosure, withdrawal, and risks to offline social functioning.
“This conceptualization is consistent with emerging evidence that AI companion use can involve emotional attachment, over-reliance, self-disclosure, withdrawal, and risks to offline social functioning, while also recognizing that AI companion dependency is distinctive because the object of dependence is experienced as a responsive social other rather than a neutral tool (Boine, 2023; Hu et al., 202”
From When loneliness amplifies the risk of problematic emotional dependence: perceived anthropomorphism and basic psychological need satisfaction in AI companion use (2026) · cites this paper as Boine, 2023
AI companion dependency is distinctive because the object of dependence is experienced as a responsive social other rather than a neutral tool.
“This conceptualization is consistent with emerging evidence that AI companion use can involve emotional attachment, over-reliance, self-disclosure, withdrawal, and risks to offline social functioning, while also recognizing that AI companion dependency is distinctive because the object of dependence is experienced as a responsive social other rather than a neutral tool (Boine, 2023; Hu et al., 202”
From When loneliness amplifies the risk of problematic emotional dependence: perceived anthropomorphism and basic psychological need satisfaction in AI companion use (2026) · cites this paper as Boine, 2023
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My Chatbot Companion - a Study of Human-Chatbot Relationships
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Moradbakhti, L., Schreibelmayr, S., & Mara, M. (2022) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2022.855091 · Cited by 67
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- Neil Richards and Woodrow Hartzog, "The Pathologies of Digital Consent," Washington University Law Review 96, no. 6 (2019): 1461-503, https://journals.library.wustl.edu/lawreview/article/id/6218/. ↩
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- Daniel Kahneman, Paul Slovic, and Amos Tversky, eds., Judgment Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1982);
- Cass R. Sunstein, "Fifty Shades of Manipulation," in Sunstein, The Ethics of Influence: Government in the Age of Behavioral Science (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016), 78-115, https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781316493021.005; · DOI
- Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein, Nudge, rev. ed. (New York: Penguin, 2021);
- Calo, "Digital market manipulation."; Philipp Hacker, "Manipulation by Algorithms: Exploring the Triangle of Unfair Commercial Practice, Data Protection, and Privacy Law," European Law Journal (2021): 1-34, https://doi.org/10.1111/eulj.12389. ↩ · DOI
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“Therefore, to better anticipate these effects, it is crucial to understand the emotional dynamics of human-AI relationships, as they likely influence both the psychological benefits and the risks of sustained AI companionship [11, 57, 70].”
Liu, T., Shih, R.-M., Luo, T., & Jin, S. (2026) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1900817
Metadata
- Authors
- Boine, C.
- Affiliations
- Centre for Law, Technology, and Society, and Accountable AI in a Global Context, University of Ottowa
- ORCID
- Boine, Claire
- Venue
- MIT Case Studies in Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing
- Publisher
- Knowledge Futures
- Published
- 2023-02-26
- Issue
- Winter 2023
- Cited by
- 34
- References
- 10
- Language
- en
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