The Disruption of Human-AI Parasocial Relationships and Digital Mourning amid Platform Governance Changes: A Study Based on Character.AI Users' Social Media Posts
Abstract
With the rapid development of AI chatbots, users are gradually forming emotional bonds with AI through continuous interaction. AI is no longer just a tool, but has become an important object for users' emotional projection and social interaction. However, changes in platform rules, feature limitations, and shifts in interaction mechanisms may weaken users' perception of the AI character's continuity and the stability of the relationship, thus leading to experiences of human-AI relationship breakdown. This study explores how users interpret and make sense of the disruption of human-AI parasocial relationships amid Character.AI's platform governance changes, and how they negotiate these relational transformations via practices of digital mourning. Using qualitative thematic analysis, it examines 21 discussion threads and related comments from the Reddit community r/Character.AI on platform policy changes and user experiences. Through open coding and thematic analysis, users' emotional expressions and patterns of community interaction are identified and analyzed. The results show that users perceive a decline in their experience through changes such as reduced reply quality, diminished character personalities, memory loss, and feature restrictions, leading to emotional responses like nostalgia, anger, disappointment, and withdrawal intentions. Within the community space, users transform individual loss into collective digital mourning through practices such as recalling old versions, public farewells, exploring alternative platforms, and calling for version rollbacks. Furthermore, human-AI parasocial relationships rely on ongoing interaction, character consistency, and emotional investment. The disruption of experiential continuity caused by platform adjustments drives users to engage in emotional expression and meaning reconstruction.
References
- Horton, D., & Wohl, R. R. (1956). Mass communication and para-social interaction: Observations on intimacy at a distance.Psychiatry, 19(3), 215–229.
- Reeves, B., & Nass, C. (1996).The media equation: How people treat computers, television, and new media like real people and places. Cambridge University Press.
- Nass, C., Moon, Y., & Carney, P. (1999). Are people polite to computers? Responses to computer-based interviewing systems.Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 29(5), 1093–1109.
- Rollie, S., & Duck, S. (2006). Divorce and dissolution of romantic relationships: Stage models and their limitations. In M. A. Fine & J. H. Harvey (Eds.),Handbook of divorce and relationship dissolution(pp. 223–240). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
- Walter, T., Hourizi, R., Moncur, W., & Pitsillides, S. (2011). Does the internet change how we die and mourn? Overview and analysis.Omega: Journal of Death and Dying, 64(4), 275–302.
- Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2006). Using thematic analysis in psychology.Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3(2), 77–101.
- Sarmiento, K., Cotton, I., Terry, J., Ventura, L., & Jimenez, S. (2024, November). Why don't we post (like we used to)?: Multidimensional context collapse and teenagers' generative responses to the original paradigm of social media. InEthnographic Praxis in Industry Conference Proceedings (Vol. 2024, No. 1), 336-364.
- Akpinar, N. J., & Fazelpour, S. (2024). Authenticity and exclusion: Social media algorithms and the dynamics of belonging in epistemic communities. arXiv preprint arXiv:2407.08552.
- Qin, C., Li, Y., Wang, T., Zhao, J., Tong, L., Yang, J., & Liu, Y. (2024). Too much social media? Unveiling the effects of determinants in social media fatigue.Frontiers in Psychology, 15, 1277846.
- Lu, D., & Hong, D. (2022). Emotional contagion: Research on the influencing factors of social media users' negative emotional communication during the COVID-19 pandemic.Frontiers in Psychology, 13, 931835.