New Delhi, Aug. 9 -- Over general chatter, I mentioned something I had been working on using ChatGPT. "You call your ChatGPT 'It'?" a friend asked in great surprise. "Not 'she' or 'he'?"

Thankfully, I haven't been tempted to gender AI assistants or think of them as friends or family. But we know that it's only too easy to develop an emotional dependency on any entity that seems warm and supportive.

For most people, falling in love with virtual avatars and marrying robots seems crazily off the charts. But to a lesser degree and more insidiously, AI is beginning to impact emotional and relationship health. It's a dangerous trend from which we need to protect ourselves.

I use AI assistants for many things: beautifying my music lists, lear...