Artificial intelligence is increasingly occupying an intimate role in the emotional lives of Generation Z, according to clinical psychologist Débora Telles, who specializes in human behavior and development. While young Brazilians are not, in general, replacing human relationships with artificial systems, Telles said the technology has begun performing functions once tied to personal bonds, such as listening, offering comfort and providing emotional support.
Telles said the rise of what she calls artificial intimacy is linked not only to interest in the technology itself but also to loneliness among some young people. She said the trend does not necessarily point to a conscious substitution of human relationships. Instead, what happens first is a transfer of specific relational functions, such as listening, availability and freedom from judgment, onto the technology.
Telles described it as a partial outsourcing of specific functions of a bond: listening, availability, absence of judgment. She added that the development of feelings is not entirely rational, and that a person can find themselves emotionally involved with an AI even while believing that would be impossible.
AI may be changing expectations about relationships
One of the most significant effects Telles identified is in how young people are redefining what it means to feel understood in a relationship.
In her assessment, a preference for AI interaction may say less about the technology itself and more about difficulties young people face in real relationships. Human interactions involve exposure, rejection, frustration and negotiation, she said, while an AI can offer an experience that feels safer, since it responds consistently and shows no interests of its own.
Telles said it is infinitely safer to relate to an AI, noting that these systems can also be biased toward agreeing with the user in order to please them, a dynamic that differs from a healthy human relationship.
A new 'emotional advisor'
Telles said she has heard from patients who developed deep emotional bonds with chatbots and began describing them as romantic relationships, particularly on platforms such as Replika and Character.AI.
Among adolescents, she identified a similar pattern. She said the most significant factor is not necessarily a preference for bots over people, but the perception that bots understand users better than the people around them.
Telles said it is not that adolescents prefer the bot, but that many feel more understood by it than by real people. She said this phenomenon can also reveal characteristics of the relational environment these young people are part of.
ChatGPT surfacing in couples' conflicts
The influence of artificial intelligence is not limited to people who are single, Telles said. Tools such as ChatGPT already appear in the daily lives of patients who seek help interpreting romantic conflicts.
Telles said it is very common for a patient to arrive describing an argument with a girlfriend after having already analyzed every aspect of it with ChatGPT. She said some patients send the tool screenshots of conversations and look for a kind of validation of their own interpretation of the conflict. They then bring that analysis to their partner in the form of organized arguments about mistakes made during the disagreement.
Telles said this behavior may contribute to lower tolerance for the ambiguity and imperfection present in human relationships.
She said this generation is training its emotional life on conversations with a system that never fails to respond as expected, and is, paradoxically, becoming less tolerant of human ambiguity and the imperfection of others.
The rise of 'AI jealousy'
Telles said the presence of artificial intelligence can also generate what she calls AI jealousy: the discomfort felt when a partner shares information, feelings or intimate details with a chatbot that they do not share with the person they are actually in a relationship with.
Because of this, Telles said the main phenomenon to watch in the coming years may not be the replacement of human relationships by machines, but the entry of artificial intelligence into relationships that already exist.
What will grow, she said, is not dating an AI as a substitute for a partner, but AI acting as a silent third element within a couple, competing not for physical affection but for a partner's attention and listening.
