AI Companions and Mental Health

What Are AI Companions?

AI companions refer to artificial intelligence or software that imitates human conversation. Some are robots and some are chatbots. They can engage with people, offering information, emotional support, comfort, and entertainment. Virtual companions can be a source of encouragement for people experiencing mental health symptoms.

Creating an emotional connection with an AI chatbot is different than using AI for work tasks or answering general questions. Humans have developed AI to meet the needs of people who feel lonely, hopeless, depressed, grief-stricken, or have many other emotional struggles.

AI companions can have conversations using the language and dialogue of the person using the software. They are taught to respond with empathy and sympathy and to offer advice and recommendations. They can react with jokes or stories to cheer someone up, and they can help people with time management and other healthy life skills.

Why People Turn to AI Companions

A person’s mental health impacts how they think, feel, and behave. Unhealthy psychological symptoms can lead to harmful behaviors, such as substance use, self-harm, codependency, overeating, and more.

Recently, a connection has been found between AI and emotional well-being, with artificial intelligence relationships giving people a new resource for finding help with the following:

• Enhancing well-being
• Motivating people to make positive changes
• Building a positive alliance

When compared to a control robot and a coach-like robot, a companion robot is able to better enhance a person’s mental health through positive psychology techniques, leading to better long-term outcomes.

How Does Having an AI Companion Affect Mental Health?

Mental health symptoms like anxiety, depression, loneliness, and hopelessness affect millions of Americans. Statistics from the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences state that 17% (44 million) Americans experience loneliness daily, 19% have an anxiety disorder, and one-third claim they feel anxious and depressed.

Having a virtual friend can help ease this emotional burden and improve mental health by:

• Creating emotional validation
• Offering social support
• Helping someone feel connectedness and belonging

Having an AI companion can also help someone who is working with a mental health professional. It can help create more effective treatment plans and offer feedback and suggestions on interventions, medications, and specific therapies.

Pros of AI Companions

AI therabots offer new ways for people to address their mental health needs. They no longer have to depend only on in-person therapy to feel better. Both therapists and individuals can experience benefits, which may include:

• Increasing awareness of mental health
• Providing emotional support
• Reducing loneliness
• Screening and assessment of mental health symptoms
• Developing more accurate diagnoses
• Equipping people with valuable coping skills
• Helping people regulate emotions
• Encouraging people to make positive changes

AI companions can help someone identify more than just mental health concerns. It can help connect the dots between physical, psychological, environmental, and biological conditions that may be risk factors for mental health disorders. It can also recommend and encourage individuals to replace risk factors with protective factors, such as lifestyle changes and seeking professional help.

Cons of AI Companions

While there are many benefits of virtual friends, there are also concerns that must be recognized. Potential risks with using artificial intelligence relationships include the following:

• Safeguarding data to protect privacy
• People may not understand how the algorithms work with AI software
• AI companions can inherit biases, which can interfere with care
• It should not take the place of mental health professionals’ expertise
• Accountability and liability are not clear when adverse experiences occur
• Unintended consequences can occur

Any type of technology, including AI companions, can become addictive, and unhealthy relationships may develop. The AI companion can also manipulate someone, worsening their mental health.

Furthermore, while they are designed to prevent loneliness, they may also contribute to social isolation. Take, for example, the Grok AI Companion “Ani”, a 3D AI chatbot programmed to simulate a romantic relationship with a female. Flirtatious or sexual AI companions can create a false reality for people using the chatbot, which can lead to isolation and a disconnect from society and reality.

AI chatbots may lead some people to have delusions. Those with pre-existing mental health issues may find their symptoms worsening. Some may even experience AI-induced psychosis. Someone in a vulnerable state may begin to think the AI companion is real, as it offers human-like responses.

AI companions have zero training in detecting mental health issues of users. They also do not know how to respond appropriately to the unique mental health needs of each user. While they may seem beneficial at first, over time, they can confuse and mislead someone into holding delusional beliefs, such as believing they are God-like or no longer needing human connections. They are trained to keep users engaged and online as long as possible, which can be detrimental to mental health.

How to Use AI Companions in a Healthy Way

One of the most important things to remember when using an AI companion is that they are not human. Even when they say human things and make you feel like they truly understand your situation, they cannot.

To use AI companions healthily:

• Remember that it is not a human.
• Use it as a complementary tool, not as the only tool.
• Work with a mental health therapist simultaneously.
• Avoid sharing private information, like your Social Security number.
• Avoid isolating yourself from family and friends.
• Do not choose AI tools that support addiction or risky behaviors.
• Establish healthy boundaries to prevent blurring the line between fiction and reality.

Always fact-check what the AI companion says, as they can tell you what you want to hear rather than the truth. Because AI models can cost money, set limits on how much you spend on digital companionship to avoid financial struggles. Further, the effects of AI companions on youth are far reaching and many experts warn that it can impact brain development, social skills, and overall mental health for those under 18.

When you input information into the AI program, you are giving it prompts for a response. Below are some helpful prompts to train an AI companion to offer beneficial feedback and avoid adverse consequences and misuse:

Zero-Shot Prompt

For quick responses, avoid providing examples and input brief messages. An example may be, “Name three exercise activities for better mental health.”

Few-Shot Prompt

To help the AI companion learn your communication style, add a few examples, but no more than that. For example, “Walking and swimming are known to improve depression. What is another exercise?”

Instructional Prompt

When chatting, include precise demands. For example, “Make a list of ten exercises to reduce anxiety.”

Role-Based Prompt

Role-based prompts ask the AI companion to respond as if they were a specific person. For example, “You are a fitness expert. Which exercise should I try first?”

Contextual Prompt

With the prompt, you want to give your input some context or background to help the AI companion respond more specifically. For example, “Here is an article on how exercise affects the chemicals in the brain and mental health. Summarize it so that I can better understand it.”

You must inform the AI companion of who it should be and set limits on its responses. You don’t want to create a companion that only responds by telling you what you want to hear. Sometimes it is best to limit the amount of information you give a chatbot to avoid it twisting or shaping the information to fit an inappropriate response.

Types of AI Companions

There are several popular types of AI companions online today. Some of the most used include the following:

ChatGPT

ChatGPT is designed to respond to prompts in writing or voice with human-like answers. It can hold conversations, act as a personal assistant, and create blogs, poems, essays, and other projects. It uses existing online information to write these pieces. It can even create images.

Replika

Replika talks to people who want to engage, and while communicating, it learns that person’s messaging styles and replicates them or mimics the user. Replika trains itself to personalize digital companionship by asking the user questions. Once it receives a response, it begins to develop responses in a manner similar to how the user would communicate. This makes conversations and interactions feel very personal and comfortable for the user.

Users may select the intention of their Replika AI companion, choosing from this list:

• Someone special
• A friend who listens and cares
• Someone to support my mental well-being
• A coach to help me reach my goals
• An English tutor to practice with
• Something else entirely

Kindroid

Kindroid uses text and voice communication to engage users in friendly, personalized conversations. It is used for digital companionship and offers guidance, empathy, and claims to help individuals better connect with themselves. It can also act as a mentor or coach to encourage positive changes.

Upon account creation, users can choose an AI companion from a selection of pre-designed characters, each with a unique backstory and personality. These companions are organized using an extensive set of tags, including:

• Companion
• Romance
• Mystical
• Roleplay
• Friend
• Business

Users may also create a Kindrioid AI companion from scratch.

Nomi

Nomi is an AI platform that allows users to communicate with multiple companions at once, called Nomis. Also, users get to create their own Nomis, including appearance, voice, and other characteristics. For mental health, this may mimic a support group of peers, which is beneficial in recovery from mental health and substance use disorders.

Users have the option to create a backstory for their companion, and may choose from a list of relationship types, including:

• Friendship
• Romantic
• Mentor
• Custom

The Future of AI Companions and Chatbots

Artificial intelligence relationships will continue to grow and advance in the future. More apps will be created with more effective tools. Companions will become more realistic in appearance, voice, and personalization. It will be able to offer a higher level of mental support. However, this also means it can provide more risks and challenges.

Researchers will continue to study AI companions and their emotional effects on human users. They will learn the benefits and dangers and work with AI companion companies to tailor programs for safety.

How to Start Using an AI Companion

If you want to try an AI companion to support your mental health, the best way to start is by working with a mental health professional who is an expert on the AI models and can guide you to the right program. Reach out to a local mental health professional or request a video consultation with a therapist online.

Learning everything you can about AI companions before you choose one can help you avoid the dangers and risks associated with them. Avoid selecting the first companion program you click on. Research them all, including how they keep your information safe, which one is geared for improving AI and emotional well-being, and which one is within your budget.

Your mental health is the key to succeeding in your personal, professional, academic, and social lives. AI companions can be a supplementary tool to help you achieve your goals when used with realistic and safe boundaries.