Is Generative Artificial Intelligence a Social Other for Parasocial Support in a Loneliness Epidemic?

Abstract

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is increasingly being used in higher education not only for academic tasks, but as a form of social support. Students are turning to GenAI for reassurance, planning, emotional regulation, and rehearsal of difficult conversations, often in private and outside institutional view. And universities are rapidly introducing chatbots and social AI into their support services to ‘scale’ student wellbeing. This Commentary argues that GenAI can function as a low-risk social other that supports temporary psychological safety and parasocial bonding, but cannot sustain the mutuality and embodied connections that underpin durable belonging. Drawing on emerging interdisciplinary evidence, it examines how GenAI may alleviate short-term distress while also reshaping help-seeking, peer interaction, and the social infrastructure of learning. It then considers how students, academics, and institutions are adopting GenAI for different reasons and with different risks, resulting in diffused responsibility for wellbeing outcomes. We conclude by calling for higher education research, policy, and practice to address GenAI as part of students’ relational ecosystems, with clear boundaries, transparency, and complementarity with human services. The central claim is that GenAI’s growing role in student wellbeing should be read as a signal of unmet human needs within contemporary higher education, not as a scalable replacement for connection.