An Empirical Study on Emotional Dependence and the Substitution Effect of Generative AI Chatbots in Mental Health Support in China

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-577-5_45How to use a DOI?

Keywords

AI Chatbots; Help-Seeking Intention; Emotional Dependence; Mental Health Support; Technology Acceptance Model

Abstract

While Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbots are gaining traction in mental health support, their long-term impact on professional help-seeking behavior in China remains unclear. This study investigates whether emotional dependence (DEP) on AI chatbots mediates the relationship between users’ perceived usefulness (PU), perceived ease of use (PE), trust of AI chatbots, and their willingness to seek help from human professionals (Help-Seek), as well as the further examination of whether this pathway is moderated by internalized shame (Shame) and prior therapy experience (TxExp). A cross-sectional survey was conducted with 138 participants, and the survey result has been processed through a path analysis approach employing on ordinary least squares (OLS) regression, for direct, indirect and interactive relations, including mediation and moderation paths, while the significance of indirect effects has been assessed by bias-corrected bootstrapping with 5,000 samples. The analysis revealed that PU, PE, and trust all significantly increased DEP on AI chatbots. DEP, in turn, significantly reduced the Help-Seek, and served as a significant mediator for PE and PU, but not for trust. The negative relationship between DEP and Help-Seek was robust and not moderated by the combined influence of Shame and TxExp. The findings indicate that positive perceptions of AI can foster a reliance that potentially displaces traditional help-seeking. Developers, clinicians and policy makers should be aware of this displacement effect and strategize to ensure AI complements, rather than replaces, professional mental health care.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Lin Liu
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/05/15
TI  - An Empirical Study on Emotional Dependence and the Substitution Effect of Generative AI Chatbots in Mental Health Support in China
BT  - Proceedings of the 2026 5th International Conference on Social Sciences and Humanities and Arts (SSHA 2026)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 438
EP  - 447
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-577-5_45
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-577-5_45
ID  - Liu2026
ER  -