Do Personal AI Conversations Reduce Loneliness? Evidence from a Pre-Registered Experiment

Louis Fréget, Ariell Reshef () and Claudia Senik ()
Additional contact information
Louis Fréget: Université Paris Dauphine-PSL - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres, UCL - University College London [UCL]
Ariell Reshef: PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement - ENPC - École nationale des ponts et chaussées - IP Paris - Institut Polytechnique de Paris, UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, CESifo - LMU - Ludwig Maximilian University [Munich] = Ludwig Maximilians Universität München
Claudia Senik: PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement - ENPC - École nationale des ponts et chaussées - IP Paris - Institut Polytechnique de Paris, PJSE - Paris Jourdan Sciences Economiques - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement - ENPC - École nationale des ponts et chaussées - IP Paris - Institut Polytechnique de Paris, SU - Sorbonne Université, IUF - Institut universitaire de France - M.E.N.E.S.R. - Ministère de l'Education nationale, de l’Enseignement supérieur et de la Recherche

Working Papers from HAL

Abstract: Generative AI is increasingly promoted as a remedy for loneliness. We test this claim in a large-scale pre-registered experiment on a large sample of French adults. Partici- pants assigned to treatment were asked to hold at least one personal conversation a day with a generative AI tool of their choice for 28 days; the control group continued as usual. The intervention raised socio-emotional AI use substantially. In response, subjective loneliness increased. Other measures of subjective well-being were also consistently adversely affected, although these effects are imprecisely estimated.

Keywords: Loneliness; Socialconnectedness; Subjectivewell-being; GenerativeAI; PersonalAIconversations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-10
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-05705909v2
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://shs.hal.science/halshs-05705909v2/document (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-05705909

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().