Extended chatbot use produced dose-dependent increases in loneliness and emotional dependence alongside lower socialisation (review attribution)¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · design r1 · q2
Currency · newest study 2026 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? In a four-week randomised controlled trial with 981 participants, chatbot use dose-dependently increased loneliness and emotional dependence and lowered socialisation with real people. → Mahbub Ul Alam 2026

Evidence¶

Mahbub Ul Alam 2026¶

Mahbub Ul Alam. (2026). PAUSE: A Privacy-Preserving Self-Reflection Tool for AI-Associated Cognitive Offloading. arXiv. https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.13155 doi:10.48550/arxiv.2609.13155

q2 · i? · design · r1

The review attributes to Fang et al. (2025) a four-week randomised controlled trial with 981 participants finding "dose-dependent increases in loneliness and emotional dependence". No effect size is printed.

"Fang et al. (2025), in a four-week randomised controlled trial with 981 participants and over 300,000 messages, found dose-dependent increases in loneliness and emotional dependence with chatbot use, alongside lower socialisation with real people."

Discussion¶

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