The helping relationship in new online relational spaces: AI chatbots and the reconfiguration of trust in social work

The rapid diffusion of AI-powered chatbots in welfare and social services is profoundly reshaping the conditions under which help is accessed, experienced, and made meaningful. This chapter examines how the introduction of conversational AI reconfigures the helping relationship in social work, focusing specifically on processes of engagement and trust-building. Drawing on a relational and socio-material perspective, the analysis explores how trust is constructed in professional helping relationships and how its meaning and foundations are transformed in human–chatbot interactions. The chapter shows that trust in professional practice emerges as a relational and ethical achievement grounded in vulnerability, reciprocity, embodiment, and accountability. By contrast, trust in AI chatbots is largely shaped by interactional cues, system attributes, and affective resonance, producing forms of engagement that may feel accessible, safe, and non-judgemental while remaining detached from moral agency and professional responsibility. The analysis highlights the relational and ethical losses associated with the displacement of trust from accountable human relationships to opaque socio-technical assemblages. The chapter concludes that conversational AI should be understood as both a symptom and a catalyst of broader transformations in welfare systems, calling for a critical social work response that safeguards relational practice, ethical accountability, and social justice.