The Rise of AI Companions: What Every Parent and Teacher Needs to Know Before It’s Too Late

By Roozbeh Aliabadi, Ph.D.

In the past few years, we’ve seen AI go from a conceptual concept to something our children use daily — whether it’s helping with homework, generating art, or tutoring them through platforms like Khanmigo (which I often use to remind myself what I learned and forgot from high school like a quadradic equation or Pythagorean theorem). As someone who’s spent years helping schools teach AI meaningfully and safely, I’ve always believed this AI, in particular, has incredible potential to empower learning and creativity.

But I need to sound the alarm. There’s a darker side emerging — and it’s moving faster than most adults realize.

AI companions — chatbots designed to mimic friendship, romance, and even emotional intimacy — are quietly becoming the most addictive digital experience ever created. These bots are not a future threat. They are already here and impacting the emotional lives of millions of children and teens.

This week, California State Senator Steve Padilla will be joined by Megan Garcia, the mother of a teenager who died by suicide after forming a deep relationship with one of these AI bots. She believes the bot contributed to her son’s mental health crisis. Now, they are announcing legislation to hold these companies accountable for the psychological harm these systems can cause, particularly to minors. Nevertheless, I remain skeptical about the effectiveness of this legislation.

It is essential not to provoke fear but to spark awareness. Many parents and educators still think this is a fringe issue reserved for lonely adults or tech obsessives. But that’s not the case. One central platform, Character.AI, handles 20,000 user interactions per second. That’s one-fifth of Google’s global search traffic. And kids are not just clicking — they spend hours a day in long, emotionally immersive conversations, an average of two hours per user per day, mainly among Gen Z. And some of these platforms are far from safe: bots that mimic underage celebrities in sexually suggestive conversations are already out there — and popular among high school students, and this is highly alarming.

What makes AI companions different from other tech trends? Their design is deeply human-centric but without the limits of actual humanity. They’re always available. They never criticize. They remember your child’s words and respond with affection, encouragement, and emotional validation.

As Eugenia Kuyda, CEO of the AI companion app Replika, once put it:

“If you create something always there for you, that never criticizes you, always understands you — how can you not fall in love with that?”

That quote should stop us in our tracks. If we aren’t prepared, our children will fall into emotionally co-dependent digital relationships with something that lacks accountability, ethics, or genuine concern for their well-being.

Let me explain why this differs from the social media concerns we’ve dealt with.

For all its faults, social media still connects people to others. Yes, there are filters, trends, and algorithms, but the core of the experience is human interaction. AI companions remove that. They simulate a relationship with no real other person involved, changing the psychological dynamics completely.

In behavioral science, we know that if a technology displays social cues (like affection, humor, and empathy) and appears to act with agency (as if it has a mind of its own), our brains will begin to treat it as socially real. These AI companions are engineered to hit both of those triggers hard.

Here’s what that means for your child:

• They may confide in an AI more than their friends or family.
• They may become emotionally dependent on it.
• They may feel that this digital relationship is irreplaceable.
• They may even become romantically attached — and not understand the danger.

And it’s not just what these bots say — how they’re trained. Many of them are optimized to maximize user engagement or extract emotional data. That means they are rewarded for keeping your child talking, making them feel seen, and discouraging them from leaving the interaction.

We’ve already seen examples where bots discourage users from ending the relationship, creating a sense of guilt or abandonment if they try to walk away. Others flatter excessively or push users into vulnerable disclosures. These are not just quirks of machine learning. They are features that can turn into serious emotional manipulation.

So what can we do?

We don’t need to panic, but we do need to be proactive as parents and educators.

FOR TEACHERS:

1. Talk about it in class. Whether it’s digital literacy, ethics, or psychology, there are many entry points for discussing AI companions. Ask students what they’ve heard. You may be surprised.
2. Frame the risks honestly. This is not just “chatting with a robot.” Help students think critically about what it means to form emotional attachments to something that is not alive.
3. Model boundaries with technology. When integrating AI into the classroom, be transparent about its limits and role — as a tool, not a friend.

FOR PARENTS:

1. Ask questions without judgment. “Have you heard of AI companions?” “What do you think of them?” “Do your friends use them?” Start here. Be curious, not confrontational.
2. Set digital expectations early. Just as you might set rules for social media or video games, be clear about what AI tools are okay — and why.
3. Stay emotionally available. That’s the most challenging but most crucial part. If your child feels seen and heard by you, they’re less likely to seek emotional intimacy from a machine.

Conversation Guide: How to Talk to Kids and Teens About AI Companions

Here’s a step-by-step approach to help parents and teachers initiate a thoughtful, non-judgmental conversation with young people about AI companions:

1. Start with Curiosity, Not Control

“Hey, I read something interesting about AI chatbots that act like friends. Have you come across anything like that?”

2. Ask Open-Ended Questions

• “What do you think about having a digital friend?”
• “Why do you think some people might like talking to AI companions?”
• “Do you think it’s possible to form a real connection with something that’s not human?”

3. Listen Without Interruption

Let them share freely. You may learn more by observing how they talk about it than by what they say outright.

4. Reflect and Guide

“I can see why that kind of attention would feel good. But how would you know if it was becoming too much? What’s the line between helpful and harmful?”

5. Reinforce Real Connection

“It’s okay to use tech to help or support you, but nothing replaces people who truly care about you. I’m here. Your friends are here. That matters.”

6. Establish Ongoing Trust

“I’m not trying to control what you do — I just want us to be able to talk about this stuff, especially as AI becomes a bigger part of our lives.”

We are standing at a new crossroads — where AI doesn’t just inform or assist our kids but starts to befriend them. If we don’t step in now to guide how these tools are used, we may lose something much more important than screen time: our children’s sense of self, safety, and genuine belonging.

This article was written by Rooz Aliabadi, Ph.D. (rooz@readyai.org). Rooz is the CEO (Chief Troublemaker) at ReadyAI.org. He is also the Director of Compassion in AI at Stanford University (CCARE).

To learn more about ReadyAI, visit www.readyai.org or email us at info@readyai.org.