ArticleJMIR mental health2024
The Machine Speaks: Conversational AI and the Importance of Effort to Relationships of Meaning.
Article in JMIR mental health, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed.
- Conversational AI should fill the white space in mental health care, not replace humans.NPJ digital medicine · 2026Review
- The paradox of agency in psychotherapy: How people with mental distress experience support from generative AI chatbots and human therapists.BMC psychiatry · 2025Article
- The Mental Health Impacts of Internet Scams.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2025Review
- Exploring the Ethical Challenges of Conversational AI in Mental Health Care: Scoping Review.JMIR mental health · 2025Article
- Responsible Design, Integration, and Use of Generative AI in Mental Health.JMIR mental health · 2025Article
- An Ethical Perspective on the Democratization of Mental Health With Generative AI.JMIR mental health · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The focus of debates about conversational artificial intelligence (CAI) has largely been on social and ethical concerns that arise when we speak to machines-what is gained and what is lost when we replace our human interlocutors, including our human therapists, with AI. In this viewpoint, we focus instead on a distinct and growing phenomenon: letting machines speak for us. What is at stake when we replace our own efforts at interpersonal engagement with CAI? The purpose of these technologies is, in part, to remove effort, but effort has enormous value, and in some cases, even intrinsic value. This is true in many realms, but especially in interpersonal relationships. To make an effort for someone, irrespective of what that effort amounts to, often conveys value and meaning in itself. We elaborate on the meaning, worth, and significance that may be lost when we relinquish effort in our interpersonal engagements as well as on the opportunities for self-understanding and growth that we may forsake.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.