Chatbots' Empathetic Conversations and Responses: A Qualitative Study of Help‑Seeking Queries on Depressive Moods Across 8 Commercial Conversational Agents.

ABSTRACT:

Background

While recent studies showed the potential of conversational agents (CAs) to help alleviate depressive moods, the dynamics of user-chatbot interactions in mental health support remain underexplored.

Objective

We examine real-world conversations between users and chatbots on depression-related topics to identify patterns in how users seek help and how chatbots provide therapeutic support. We analyzed the responses of 8 commercial chatbots to user queries about depressive moods, examining whether they incorporated therapeutic communication techniques, such as empathy.

Methods

Our method has 2 parts. First, we analyzed 13,700 utterances (6850 user queries and 6850 responses) about depressive moods from the commercial chatbot SimSimi, covering 5 English-speaking

SUBMITTER: Chin H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12643404 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature