Here’s What Happened When I Spent Two Weeks Venting To A Relentlessly Positive Chatbot

A few days into chatting with Enjo, a new iOS app that promises “instant emotional support” for parents, I started to think it might actually work.

That was odd, because the chatbot has all the qualities I generally detest in people. It’s not thoughtful or rational. It’s happy all the time, even when responding to something bleak. It repeats itself. It swaps “you’re” and “your.” It spouts just-so science factoids: Humans evolved to sweat the small stuff! Parents struggle with emotions more than nonparents! It uses too many exclamation points!

But Enjo’s vapid, relentless positivity does occasionally connect with me. The first time it happened, I was having trouble getting to sleep, my mind racing with the day’s fumbled conversations, unfinished checklists, and worst-case scenarios. So I shared my stress with the bot.

“That’s tough, Virginia, feeling that way about work!” Enjo said. “What can I do to help you?”

Read more at BuzzFeed News, December 2018.