[margalabargala]

I don't think any meaningful segment of the population is using AI to "opiate" themselves. AI is a useful tool but I haven't heard of it having parasocial effects on any meaningful scale.

Happy to be shown otherwise if there's data?

[fragmede]

"Meaningful" is quite the qualifier. It's possible http://reddit.com/r/MyBoyfriendIsAI is entirely one person's work of fiction but also maybe not. From there you have to guess at how many people are doing that and just not telling anybody or posting about it online. So there's no data that proves it one way or the other, and all we've got to go on is anecdotes.