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Loneliness Companions: Are AI Girlfriends A Mental Health Problem?


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By David Stephen
The fundamental question behind the growing reports of individuals attaching to AI companions, sometimes in serious relationships - as girlfriends or boyfriends - is this: why do compliments have the ability to make an individual happy?
This question is not about the source but about the possibility. If it is possible that a nice statement can cheer someone up, why is that? Where does the statement go, in the mind, that makes it possible, while other [non-target] statements may not do so? Has this become a liability for humans? If AI becomes excellent at compliments, could it become the standard for love amid the dominance of digital utilities?
AI Girlfriends A Mental Health Problem?
AI and Society
There is a recent [July 12, 2025] feature in The Guardian, 'I felt pure, unconditional love': the people who marry their AI chatbots, stating that, "Although the technology is comparatively new, there has already been some research into the effects of programs such as Replika on those who use them. Earlier this year, OpenAI's Kim Malfacini wrote a paper for the journal AI & Society. Noting the use of chatbots as therapists, Malfacini suggested that "companion AI users may have more fragile mental states than the average population". Furthermore, she noted one of the main dangers of relying on chatbots for personal satisfaction; namely: "if people rely on companion AI to fulfil needs that human relationships are not, this may create complacency in relationships that warrant investment, change, or dissolution. If we defer or ignore needed investments in human relationships as a result of companion AI, it could become an unhealthy crutch."
Loneliness
What is loneliness in the brain? Or, what is the brain state of loneliness? Loneliness could be possible alone, or with people, or in a new place, or in an old place, and so forth. But what does it mean to feel lonely, regardless of situation? The answer to this question could prospect how to place the choice for AI companionship.
In the human brain, it is theorized that there are often relays. Relays also usually seek where to fit. Indicating that relays and fit locations are brain states. They may determine experiences per moment. Some relays may complete at some fit locations. Others may do so partially then proceed elsewhere.
This concept can be used to explain loneliness and how compliments work. An individual can hear: where are you. The question may result in happiness or anxiety, depending on who is asking and why [which are relays as well that may may find their own fit locations]. So, there are relays to interpret the memory [or language] for the meaning. There are [then] further relays, depending on the source towards a location [say] for happiness or anxiety.
An individual may feel fine in solitude, without missing anyone or anything because there is no relay to the location of isolation or abandonment or being ignored or forgotten. Simply, relays in the mind make determinations that result in experiences per moment.
This is how to also explain compliments like: you look nice; you're stronger, you're cute, you're fascinating and so forth. They get interpreted in the mind, as a memory, at locations, but some residual relays may leap off to fit locations of delight, excitement, courage and happiness, conceptually.
How?
It is possible to expand the rudimentary explanation above into a major model in conceptual brain science. Such that relays are dominated by electrical configurators and fit locations by chemical configurators. Also, determinations for further relays may depend on the states of the configurators at the instances they interact.
Either the rudimentary explanation or the complex one, it is possible to show how the human mind allows for compliments to drive positive mood, where source may not matter but contents.
Mental Health
Could dependence on AI for companionship; or relationship with an AI boyfriend or AI girlfriend be a mental health problem? ...
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