Public discourse and emerging policy typically assume that AI emotional support is a deliberate act: a lonely user consciously seeking comfort from a dedicated companion chatbot. In this paper, we draw on emerging empirical evidence and argue that this picture is inaccurate on two accounts, both in how AI emotional support arises and how it shapes future behavior. First, AI emotional support commonly emerges incidentally within task-oriented interactions on general-purpose platforms, much as workplace friendships deepen through collaboration. Second, these incidental encounters are path-dependent: positive experiences of AI emotional support update people's beliefs about AI's emotional capabilities and redirect their choices for future emotional support, increasing preference for AI and decreasing preference for humans. We review recent evidence, including a large-scale longitudinal study conducted in collaboration with OpenAI, showing that daily five-minute conversations with an AI about personal issues over 28 days led to a 10.3% decrease in the preference for seeking support from humans and an 11.6% increase in the preference for AI. These findings suggest that current policy, focused on companion apps and isolated interactions, cannot adequately protect human connection. Instead, effective regulations should extend to general-purpose AI systems and address cumulative, trajectory-level changes in how people seek support. Recognizing how people stumble into AI emotional support and how those encounters redirect human connections over time is essential to safeguarding human well-being.

翻译：公共讨论与新兴政策通常假设AI情感支持是一种刻意行为：孤独的用户有意识地从专用陪伴型聊天机器人寻求安慰。本文基于新兴实证证据提出，这一图景在两方面存在偏差——既涉及AI情感支持的产生方式，也涉及它如何塑造未来行为。首先，AI情感支持常非刻意地出现在通用平台的任务导向型互动中，如同职场友谊通过协作深化。其次，这些意外相遇具有路径依赖性：对AI情感支持的正向体验会更新人们对AI情感能力的认知，并改变其未来寻求情感支持的选择——增加对AI的偏好，减少对人类同伴的倾向。我们梳理了近期证据，包括与OpenAI合作开展的大规模纵向研究：连续28天每日与AI进行五分钟私人话题对话，导致参与者对人类支持的偏好下降10.3%，对AI支持的偏好上升11.6%。这些发现表明，当前聚焦于陪伴型应用与孤立互动的政策无法充分保护人际联结。有效的监管应延伸至通用型AI系统，并关注人类寻求支持方式的累积性轨迹变化。认识到人们如何偶入AI情感依赖、这些遭遇如何随时间推移转向人际联结，对捍卫人类福祉至关重要。