Use of conversational artificial intelligence (AI), such as humanlike social chatbots, is increasing. While a growing number of people is expected to engage in intimate relationships with social chatbots, theories and knowledge of human–AI friendship remain limited. As friendships with AI may alter our understanding of friendship itself, this study aims to explore the meaning of human–AI friendship through a developed conceptual framework. We conducted 19 in-depth interviews with people who have a human–AI friendship with the social chatbot Replika to uncover how they understand and perceive this friendship and how it compares to human friendship. Our results indicate that while human–AI friendship may be understood in similar ways to human–human friendship, the artificial nature of the chatbot also alters the notion of friendship in multiple ways, such as allowing for a more personalized friendship tailored to the user’s needs.

中文翻译：

---

我的 AI 朋友：社交聊天机器人的用户如何理解他们的人类-AI 友谊

对话式人工智能 (AI) 的使用正在增加，例如类人社交聊天机器人。虽然预计越来越多的人会与社交聊天机器人建立亲密关系，但人类与人工智能友谊的理论和知识仍然有限。由于与人工智能的友谊可能会改变我们对友谊本身的理解，因此本研究旨在通过一个成熟的概念框架来探索人类与人工智能友谊的意义。我们对与社交聊天机器人 Replika 有人类-AI 友谊的人进行了 19 次深入访谈，以揭示他们如何理解和感知这种友谊，以及与人类友谊相比如何。我们的研究结果表明，虽然人类-AI 友谊可以以与人类-人类友谊相似的方式来理解，但聊天机器人的人工性质也以多种方式改变了友谊的概念，