ArticleChild development perspectives2026
AI companions and adolescent social relationships: Benefits, risks, and bidirectional influences.
Article in Child development perspectives, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
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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.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed.
- Artificial intelligence in pediatric diabetes: clinical benefits, developmental risks, and ethical challenges.European journal of pediatrics · 2026Review
- When Teens Bond With Machines: A Developmental Perspective on the New Frontier of Generative Artificial Intelligence Policy and Adolescents' Relationships.American journal of public health · 2026Article
- Educating minds with generative AI.Communications psychology · 2026Review
- Artificial Intelligence Connectedness: Theoretical Reconstruction of Connectedness and Its Impacts on Adolescent Mental Health.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
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Abstract
AI companions (AI-Cs)-rapidly emerging conversational agents built on large language models that can provide personalized humanlike companionship-create unprecedented opportunities for adolescents to form emotional bonds with nonhuman entities during a critical period for social development. In this article, we discuss the interplay between adolescents' use of AI-Cs and their social relationships based on theoretical hypotheses driving research on digital communication and adolescent well-being. We explore the benefits and risks of AI-Cs to social development based on the stimulation hypothesis and the displacement hypothesis: AI-Cs can provide safe spaces for identity exploration and emotional expression, potentially building skills that transfer to human relationships; however, concerns about AI-Cs include time displacement, psychological dependence, and unrealistic relationship expectations. We also address how adolescents' social relationships may drive their AI-C use, based on the social enhancement hypothesis and the social compensation hypothesis. Our discussion draws on studies of adolescents and adults in the United States and in other countries. We offer recommendations for research in this area, which deserves urgent investigation as these technologies advance rapidly.
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