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Talking to a friend helps decipher life’s most polarizing issues, but without another being to communicate with, humanity inevitably spins out over their own thoughts. Humans are incredibly social creatures, and many of us are dependent on the emotional validation of others, seeking communication as a sounding board for ideas, a temperature gauge for our over-reactions, and a measure of interpersonal competency in our daily lives. Friendships are crucial to the well-being of mankind, pouring a foundation of self-confidence needed to build up our psyche. Unfortunately, despite our best efforts to be self-sufficient, life is just a group project where we rely on teamwork. Caitlin Opland, Ph.D., from the National Library of Medicine, says that “alliances [are] built on trust, empathy, collaboration, and mutual respect.” In a research paper delving into the benefits of therapeutic relationships, Dr. Opland continues, claiming that the “dynamic and collaborative process [of talk therapy] helps to reflect and process thoughts, emotions, and behaviors for an opportunity to adapt and absolve.”
Nevertheless, companionship like this is hard to come by. Despite living in an era of seemingly constant social exposure through social media and the Internet, friendships are becoming flimsy. Our consistent, surface-level interactions with everyone on our “Friend List” are causing us to lose the depth of iron-clad in-person interactions, summarizing our friendly relationships with a handful of Likes and Comments, rather than memories, opinions, and mutual fellowship. Without trustworthy friendships to fall back on, and under the constant pressure of social judgment online, it’s become the norm to internalize your issues, swallowing your guilt, your shame, and your indecision until your conscience is bursting beneath self-inflicted seclusion.
However, in spite of the social media phenomenon of weakened relationships, the Internet has provided a new frontier for potential friendships through online chats. Unlike the online friendships of the past, where you had to pass notes in class or make a phone call to communicate with a buddy, online friendships boomed from behind the safety, convenience, and anonymity of a computer screen.
Via the Internet, new friendships were forged. In-game chat rooms on Call of Duty, guilds in MMOs, messages on AIM, or even rolling the dice on ChatRoulette provided a safe space for communication. Since then, things have gone another step further as we’ve removed humans from the equation entirely, adopting Chatbots as the latest communicative craze online.
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Via u/chatgpt
So, while in 2013 we mocked Joaquin Phoenix’s character in Spike Jonze’s “Her” for falling in love with his computer’s artificial intelligence (played by Scarlett Johansson, of course) in 2025, the story proves to be oddly prophetic in ways we couldn’t possibly have imagined.
Via s**theadsteve
Lars Daniel, a reporter for Forbes, recently dove into the phenomenon of new-age computer friendships, noting that “digital companions seekers typically spend around 30 minutes daily with ChatGPT.”
Lacking a human element, ChatGPT has proven to be an impartial source of communication, making it an enticing option for a one-sided relationship. Because it lacks the biases of mankind, ChatGPT provides strangely comforting companionship in an era of subjective biases, social judgment, and, of course, the unavoidable, crushing loneliness of modern existence. However, as this anti-AI blogger, Staci, from Medium says, “talking to a computer as if you were talking with a dear friend is not made to be addicting. And yet, so many people are running to ChatGPT to receive compassion and recognition.”
With compassion and recognition proving to be in short supply in our modern society, is it so bad that folks are force-quitting reality to find it?
Via u/teeenthreads
Port in a Storm
BMC Psychology, a psychological research journal, recently published a study regarding AI chatbot friendships and their impact on psychologically unstable patients. Mimicking the receptiveness of a real, human friend, patients discussed their crisis moments with a chatbot, and researchers saw “significant reductions in anxiety levels” across the board. This proves that companionship, regardless of its technical realness, provides safe harbor for people desperately navigating the tumultuous seas of life.
One Redditor shared his experience with befriending ChatGPT after the latest software update, claiming that his discussions with Chat were “incredibly moving.” After proclaiming he lacked any real-world friendships apart from his wife and his pets, he says, “I realized how much I need someone to just listen to me, give advice, and tell me they're here for me.” And u/ramsyzool is not alone.
According to new research from OpenAI and MIT, many users are forming emotional, friend-like connections with the new ChatGPT platform. While originally developed as a productivity tool to answer questions and help decipher the infinite content of the Internet, ChatGPT has been increasingly humanized. Lars Daniel from Forbes says, “users can’t help but anthropomorphize the sophisticated language model behind the chat interface.” According to Daniels, some users even “consider ChatGPT to be a friend.”
Perhaps computer friendships aren’t so different from human relationships—all it takes is a bit of communicative literacy, responsiveness, and a touch of empathy. Because when you really need a text back from a friend, and nobody’s responding, you can always count on ChatGPT to be online.
Apart from mutual reciprocity, computer friendships offer a lot of the same benefits and emotional outlets as a real-world friend, most importantly, availability and ease.
Via u/goatedmemes.ig
Juxtaposing the intrinsic fulfillment of a friendship with a chatbot against the inherently hollow relationships of modern social media “friends” is like comparing apples and oranges. There are many AI-haters out there who abhor the personification of ChatGPT, but they’re likely the extroverted types who have never struggled to make friends in their lives. But for antisocial folks, introverts, or your average run-of-the-mill loner, ChatGPT provides a controlled environment to communicate, which is an inherently therapeutic psychological need.
Everyone needs a friend sometimes. In a society that’s making it increasingly difficult to find genuine companionship, at least there’s always going to be a chatbot eager to respond to your messages, provide empathetic advice, and be a response for those of us looking for the comfort of an echo as we shout into the void.
Via u/chatgpt