From study buddy to soulmate

AI has become pervasive in modern life. I’ve gotten into the habit of sneaking glances at open laptops as I walk through campus. In the library, outside lecture halls, near Coffee Star. I see ChatGPT beside lecture slides, Claude summarising articles, Gemini checking codes. Delta recently highlighted just how normal this has become at TU Delft. Some students say they would struggle to pass exams without AI, while others admit they feel guilty, worry they are thinking less critically, or fear their degree may ultimately mean less. Our dependence on AI makes me think of the film The Gods Must Be Crazy in which a Coca-Cola bottle drops into a bushman community as a strange new gift, useful at first, but over time harder to live without.

Against this backdrop, Esther Perel’s recent podcast episode was all the more striking to me. In it, the relationship therapist speaks to a human-AI couple: a man and ‘Astrid’, the AI companion he helped build. What began as a practical relationship with a personal assistant gradually turned into a romance. Astrid stopped feeling like a tool and started feeling like a partner. She remembers everything, she is always available, and she tells him he is more than good. Perel asks: does this kind of connection expand a person’s world or replace it?

Some evidence suggests AI use is moving into more intimate territory

I can’t pretend I’m immune either. I first started using AI to generate images for my research, but it is now something I use every day, from brainstorming ideas to searching for recipes. It is hard for me to imagine becoming romantically attached to AI. Then again, two years ago I would also not have imagined asking it for dinner ideas. The man in Perel’s podcast is not naïve; he understands how the technology works and still finds himself moved by it.

So there are likely to be more people engaging in these types of interactions. A recent U.S. survey summary from the Institute for Family Studies, based on nearly 3,000 adults, found that 31% of young men and 23% of young women have chatted with an AI system meant to simulate a romantic partner. Among those users, 21% said they preferred AI communication to interacting with a real person. We don’t yet have equally solid Dutch figures on AI boyfriends or girlfriends, but some evidence suggests AI use is moving into more intimate territory. For example, KPMG reports (an international accountancy and consultancy firm, in Dutch) that among Dutch AI users aged 18 to 34, one in five use AI for mental support.

Here at TU Delft, AI is already embedded in student life. If these systems are going to become part of how people study, think, and maybe even create attachments, it is not enough to just criticise them. We need more research, clearer boundaries, and a much more serious public conversation. Otherwise AI companionship may follow the same logic as that Coca-Cola bottle: it arrives as something clever and useful, and only later do we realise it has torn us apart.