The burgeoning field of social-emotional AI is tackling the same jobs people used to think were reserved for humans: jobs that rely on emotional connections, like therapists, teachers, and coaches. AI is now widely used in education and other human services. vedantuA billion-dollar Indian web-based tutoring platform uses artificial intelligence to analyze student engagement, while a Finnish company has created “Annie Advisor”, a chatbot that works with more than 60,000 students, asking them how they are, offering help and directing them to services. Berlin-based startup Clara and I offers an AI audio robot therapist it calls “your 24/7 mental health ally,” while in the UK, limbic has a “Limbic Care” chatbot that he calls “the friendly therapy buddy.”
The question is who will be the recipient of said automation? While the rich are sometimes early adopters of technology, they also know the value of human attention. One spring day, before the pandemic, I visited an experimental school in Silicon Valley, where, like a wave of other schools that emerged seeking to “disrupt” conventional education, children used computer programs for personalized lessons in many subjects, from reading to math. . There, students learn primarily through applications, but they are not completely alone. As the limitations of automated education became apparent, this fee-paying school has added more and more time with adults since its founding a few years ago. Now, children spend all morning learning with computer applications such as Feather and TinkerThen, conduct short, small-group lessons on particular concepts taught by a human teacher. They also have weekly one-on-one 45-minute meetings with “advisors” who track their progress, but also make sure to connect emotionally.
We know that good relationships lead to better outcomes in medicine, counseling and education. Human care and attention helps people feel “seen,” and that sense of recognition underlies health and well-being, as well as valuable social goods such as trust and belonging. For example, a study conducted in the United Kingdom, titled “Is efficiency overrated?”—found that people who talked to their barista reaped more benefits in terms of well-being than those who walked past them. Researchers have found that people feel more socially connected when they have had deeper conversations and disclose more during their interactions.
However, fiscal austerity and the push to reduce labor costs have overburdened many workers, who are now charged with forging interpersonal connections, reducing the time they have to be fully present with students and patients. This has contributed to what I call a depersonalization crisis, a sense of pervasive alienation and loneliness. US government researchers found that “More than half of primary care physicians report feeling stressed due to time pressure and other work conditions..” As one pediatrician told me: “I don’t invite people to open up because I don’t have time. You know, everyone deserves all the time they need, and that’s what would really help people have that time, but it’s not cost-effective.”
The rise of personal trainers, personal chefs, personal investment advisors and other personal service workers, in what one economist has called “wealth job”—shows how the rich are solving this problem, making in-person service for the rich one of the fastest-growing occupations. But what are the options for the less fortunate?
For some, the answer is AI. Engineers who designed virtual nurses or AI therapists often told me that their technology was “better than nothing,” particularly useful for low-income people who can’t get the attention of busy nurses in community clinics, for example, or who they can’t pay it. therapy. And it’s hard to disagree when we live in what economist John Kenneth Galbraith called “private opulence and public misery.”