The core of the article, that thanks to LLM chatbots having zero IRL emotional states/responsibilities/distractions they respond in predictable, non-judgmental ways which may cause preference and even attachment to them over messy humans is a consideration for even how it may shape interactions of all ages tbh.

Consider for example the process of casually learning about a subject in a non-academic scenario. People frequently will search online, ask on forums/chat and watch videos. Search results are widely critiqued for being poor these days, so people often turn to asking communities for specific questions.

Sometimes the only communities available are beginner hostile, expecting some prerequisite understanding and even being antagonistic toward knowledge gaps (mostly because it's uninteresting to them and they've seen so many of such questions it introduces a jadedness).

It's scenarios like that where non-judgmental, always available LLMs stand out in contrast most. I have wondered though how that might shape the dependency on LLMs broadly if people get used to not having to deal with the rough edges of humans.