The couple quarreled over the "little guy" AI: "I'd rather talk to him"
(Dan Tri) - As AI increasingly penetrates life, it is unintentionally becoming the "third person" in many relationships.
The private stories of two people are inherently the tight rope of love, but in the age of AI, the appearance of the "silent person" without a form causes many paradoxes.
ChatGPT, Gemini and other chatbots are being sought out by many people to confide in, analyze arguments, compose apology messages, judge right from wrong, and even ask for advice on whether to continue a relationship.
"Tieu tam" is not a person
Recently, Ha Thu (23 years old, Hanoi) spent time re-watching a series of superhero movies to prepare for the new movie about to hit theaters.
The series spans many parts, with a series of interwoven characters and plots that sometimes make Thu unable to keep up. Each time, she opened Gemini.
From her hobby of watching movies, Ha Thu gradually came to AI as a friend to discuss details that made her curious (Illustration: Viet Huy).
At first, Thu only asked simple questions about the movie's content: Who is this character? What does this detail have to do with the previous section? Why does the character act like that? Gradually, opening Gemini became a habit.
"Why don't you ask me? You have a boyfriend right here. If you don't understand anything, ask me later," her boyfriend's reaction surprised Thu.
When Thu saw her boyfriend expressing his attitude towards this habit, she was stunned. She doesn't understand why something as small as asking a chatbot about a movie makes her boyfriend react like that. Thu even thinks he is a little "jealous" of Gemini.
Thu felt interesting when she realized her boyfriend was a little "jealous" of AI. After that, she proactively shared and discussed with him more about her interest in watching movies (Illustration: Viet Huy).
Some time later, she began to ask her boyfriend more questions about movies. He answered the first questions quite enthusiastically, explaining to her what he knew.
But Thu asked so many questions that her boyfriend lost patience. "The director directs the plot like that, how do you know what to do if you ask me?", he snapped. Thu's excitement immediately disappeared. "Gemini has never raised her voice at me like that. I would rather talk to AI than talk to you," Thu replied warmly.
"I would rather talk to AI than talk to you", said while angry, causing the two to stop talking to each other (Illustration: Viet Huy).
After that statement, Thu and her boyfriend were angry at each other and almost didn't talk for a while. Feeling both sad and resentful made her constantly ask herself: "Is his reaction too much?".
She recounted the argument with Gemini, what she said and her boyfriend's reaction. The chatbot not only took Thu's side as she feared, but analyzed the differences in the way the two people viewed the problem, pointed out the emotions of both sides and suggested how to reopen the conversation. Thu thinks that advice is quite objective.
In the end, she realized that she was exaggerating when she compared her boyfriend to a chatbot when he was a flesh-and-blood human being, with limitations, emotions, and most of all, the desire to be trusted and shared by his lover instead of being weighed against AI. She proactively apologized.
Ironically, it was the "third person" who made the two angry at each other that became the place where Thu went to learn how to make peace.
If Thu's story ended with an apology and reconciliation, Lindsey Hall, a writer and public relations expert in the US, had a completely different experience when AI appeared in her love life.
About five months after they started dating, Hall was working late at her boyfriend's house. Her phone ran out of battery, so she borrowed his computer to use ChatGPT to write emails. When opening the app, Hall happened to see and click on the chat history a section called “Relationship problems and uncertainties.”
Lindsey Hall said she does not regret reading her boyfriend's ChatGPT (Photo: Business Insider)
In a conversation with ChatGPT, her boyfriend expressed a series of concerns: from the fact that Hall has three cats, her past living in a van, her nomadic lifestyle, to her appearance. What hurt Hall the most was reading that he was “not proud of her.”
On the other side, ChatGPT responded in a way advising him to consider ending the relationship.
This discovery caused Hall to rethink the entire way the two communicated. Before that, she felt that his emotional messages had a cold tone, like they were written by AI.
After the incident was discovered, the boyfriend apologized. They tried to continue for a few more months, but Hall couldn't forget what he had read and the two eventually broke up.
She later described her feeling as being in a "three-way" relationship: herself, her lover, and a chatbot that was always present in the unsaid things.
When AI knows things your lover doesn't know
The above stories are not unique.
AI is known to many people as a tool to find information, support work or study.
But as chatbots become more and more capable of natural conversation, a part of users are starting to turn to them for more personal needs: confiding, seeking sympathy, and asking for advice on issues that are difficult to talk about with others.
According to a Pew Research Center survey conducted with 5,119 adults in the US in February, 20% of 18-29 year olds said they had used AI chatbots to seek emotional support or advice, significantly higher than 13% of 30-49 year olds.
Not only asking for advice, there are stories that users choose to tell AI but keep hidden from those around them.
The numbers partly show that the line between a technology tool and a place for people to confide their private matters is becoming more difficult to distinguish.
20% of Americans aged 18 to 29 have used AI chatbots to seek emotional support or advice (Photo: gorodenkoff/Getty Images)
Business Insider calls AI an unofficial, sometimes unwelcome "third person" in relationships.
Chatbots can be used to analyze an argument, interpret a lover's text, prepare for a difficult conversation or simply become a place for a person to say things that are not ready to share with their partner.
This is also creating a new criterion in dating.
A survey of 3,500 Gen Z and Gen Y users in the US by dating app Hily found that 64% of Gen Z and 56% of Gen Y do not want to date someone who depends on AI to make daily decisions.
The increasing intrusion of AI into private conversations is causing many people to consider the level of dependence on chatbots as a criterion when choosing a life partner (Illustration: Viet Huy).
The objection is even stronger when AI enters directly into love affairs.
Among the group that does not want to date someone dependent on AI, 75% of Gen Z and 70% of Gen Y consider using AI to analyze relationship conflicts unacceptable. Using chatbots to process emotions like a therapist also makes 69% of Gen Z and 60% of Gen Y feel uncomfortable.
Chatbots are always ready to respond, do not lose patience and can make users feel heard and understood (Illustration: Viet Huy).
However, the chatbot did not witness the argument. What AI “knows” largely comes from a story provided by one side. Therefore, a coherent and seemingly neutral answer is not synonymous with an objective judgment.
However, AI does not always have a negative impact. As in Thu's case, chatbots can help users organize their emotions, review problems, and prepare for a conversation with their lover.
The boundary therefore lies in the role humans give AI: a thinking support tool or a "referee" to judge right and wrong in love.