Kate’s real-life therapist doesn’t like her use. “She’s like, ‘Kate, assure me that you’ll never do it again. The last thing you need is more tools to get within reach. What you need is sitting upset, feeling, realizing why you feel it.'”
Taya Christianson, a spokesman for Openai, told Wired that Chatgpt is intended to be a universal tool for fact, neutrality and security. Christianson said this is not a replacement for working with mental health professionals. Christianson directed a blog post citing a collaboration between the company and the MIT Media Lab to study “how using emotionally involved AI usage (which we call emotional usage) can affect the user’s well-being.”
For Kate, Chatgpt is a soundboard that requires no need, schedule, obligation or problem. She has good friends and an older sister, but that’s not the case. “If I were to text them and prompt them for chatgpt the number of times, I would blow up their phones,” she said. “It’s really unfair. I don’t need to feel ashamed of blowing up chatgpt with my inquiry, emotional demand.”
Andrew, a 36-year-old man living in Seattle, turned to Chatgpt more and more after a difficult chapter with his family. Although he didn’t treat his changpt using “like a dirty secret”, he wasn’t particularly doing it. “I didn’t succeed in finding the therapist I had with it,” he said. “And not anyone who stretches really replaces the therapist, but to be honest, sometimes you just need someone to talk about something sitting in front of your brain.”
Andrew used chatgpt to do mundane tasks like dining plans or book summary. The day before Valentine’s Day, his then girlfriend broke up with him via text message. At first, he wasn’t sure he had been abandoned. “I think the way we communicate is always a little disconnected,” he said. The text “is not actually saying, ‘Hey, I broke up with you.”
Confusingly, he inserted the message into the chatgpt. “I’m like, hey, did she break up with me? Can you help me understand what’s going on?” Chatgpt doesn’t have much clarity. “I think this might be verified because it’s as confused as I do.”
Andrew had a group chat with close friends, and he would usually turn to talk about his own problems, but he didn’t want to burden them. “Maybe they don’t need to hear Andrew complain about his bad date life,” he said. “I kind of kick the tire in a conversation when I’m really ready to go out and ask my friends about a situation.”
In addition to solving the emotional and social complexity of the problem through AI, the level of intimate information provided by some users to Chatgpt has caused serious privacy issues. Chats should leak, or use people’s data in an immoral way, not just online passwords or emails.
When asked why the private details of her life trusted the service, Kate said, “I honestly thought about it.” “Oh my goodness, if someone just saw my timely history—you can make crazy assumptions around who you are, what you worry about or anything else.”
