AI Is Starting to Date for Us. Parents, Caregivers, and Educators Should Pay Attention.
- The White Hatter
- 17 minutes ago
- 5 min read
For years, we have encouraged parents, caregivers, and educators to think critically about how technology shapes the way young people communicate, build friendships, and develop relationships. Social media changed how many youth first met people. Messaging apps changed how they maintained those relationships and now, artificial intelligence may be poised to influence an even more personal part of human life, dating itself.
While we have written previously about AI companionship apps, where some youth and teens are developing emotional attachments and relationships with artificial intelligence, this represents a different evolution of AI. Rather than forming a relationship with AI, people are now beginning to use AI agents to form relationships for them. In this emerging model, an AI agent can communicate on a person’s behalf, initiate conversations, respond to messages, and help build connections with others online before the individuals themselves have meaningfully interacted. It marks a significant shift from AI serving as a companion to AI acting as a social intermediary between two human beings.
Several dating platforms are now exploring or introducing AI powered features that can help users create profiles, suggest conversation starters, carry on text conversations, and in some cases even communicate with a potential match before two people meaningfully interact themselves (1). The promise is simple, AI removes the awkwardness of making first contact, reduces anxiety, and increases the chances of keeping a conversation going.
While this may sound convenient, it raises an important question, “If artificial intelligence is doing more of the connecting, what opportunities are young people losing to develop the very skills that make healthy relationships possible?”
This development also raises another important question. Are we comfortable providing AI powered dating agents, and the companies that develop them, with some of our most personal and intimate information, including our sexual preferences, values, communication styles, and relationship goals? Such highly detailed personal data could have significant value beyond simply facilitating introductions, potentially informing personalization, advertising, or other commercial purposes depending on how it is collected, used, and shared. Those privacy and data governance questions deserve thoughtful discussion, and they are a topic we will explore in a future article.
Meeting someone new has never been easy. Introducing yourself, starting a conversation, interpreting another person’s reactions, handling rejection, navigating uncertainty, and building trust all require practice. These experiences can feel uncomfortable, especially for adolescents and young adults, but they are also how confidence, resilience, empathy, emotional intelligence, and communication skills are developed.
Technology has always promised to reduce friction. GPS reduced the need to navigate with maps, and spellcheck reduced the need to remember correct spelling. AI now promises to reduce the social effort involved in beginning relationships. The challenge is that not all friction is bad. Some forms of difficulty are essential to human growth. Learning to overcome nervousness before asking someone on a date, learning how to recover from an awkward conversation, or learning how to read another person’s emotions are experiences that help people mature socially. If AI consistently removes these opportunities, it may also remove opportunities for personal development.
Imagine a future where two people match on a dating platform, but instead of speaking directly, their AI assistants exchange messages first. Each assistant has been trained on its owner’s preferences, personality, interests, and communication style. By the time the two people finally meet, much of the early interaction may have been conducted by software rather than by the individuals themselves. This creates an interesting question, “Who actually formed the initial connection, was it two people getting to know one another, or two algorithms optimizing compatibility and conversation?”
Relationships are not built solely on efficiency, they are built on authenticity. Awkward moments, spontaneous humour, thoughtful questions, shared silences, and even misunderstandings all contribute to learning who another person really is. These are uniquely human experiences that artificial intelligence cannot truly experience itself, only imitate.
Although these technologies are currently aimed primarily at adults, parents should pay attention because today’s dating technologies often become tomorrow’s social technologies for younger users. Children and teenagers are growing up in a world where AI increasingly writes messages, recommends responses, creates images, edits videos, completes homework, and now may even initiate romantic conversations. Each new convenience raises an important question, “At what point does assistance become dependence?” If youth and teens become accustomed to AI speaking for them in emotionally important situations, will they become less confident speaking for themselves?
This does not mean parents and caregivers should fear artificial intelligence. We believe and teach that AI can be an incredibly valuable tool for brainstorming ideas, improving communication, or helping someone who experiences social anxiety prepare for an important conversation. There is a meaningful difference, however, between using AI as a coach and allowing AI to become the participant. One helps develop skills, while the other risks replacing them.
Healthy relationships require vulnerability. They require people to take risks, make mistakes, apologize, compromise, and learn from experience. None of these qualities can be outsourced if we hope to develop emotionally healthy adults.
Artificial intelligence may become increasingly capable of simulating empathy, maintaining conversations, and predicting what another person wants to hear. However, simulation is not the same as genuine human connection. A machine can generate words that sound caring, but it does not experience compassion, affection, trust, or love.
As parents and caregivers, perhaps the most valuable lesson we can teach our children is that meaningful relationships are not built by avoiding discomfort. They are built by learning how to move through it.
We believe artificial intelligence has an important place in education, productivity, creativity, and even personal coaching. However, when it comes to developing friendships, dating, and other deeply human relationships, technology should remain a tool rather than become a substitute. If AI is helping someone rehearse for an important conversation or build confidence before a first date, that may be beneficial. If AI is having the conversation instead, we should pause and ask what skills are no longer being developed.
Our children do not need artificial intelligence to experience life on their behalf. They need opportunities to become confident, compassionate, resilient people who can communicate honestly, navigate uncertainty, and build authentic relationships.
In an increasingly automated world, one of the greatest gifts we can give the next generation is not another digital assistant, it’s the confidence to look another person in the eyes, start a conversation, accept that it may not be perfect, and discover that genuine human connection has always been worth the effort!
Digital Food For Thought
The White Hatter
Facts Not Fear, Facts Not Emotions, Enlighten Not Frighten, Know Tech Not No Tech
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