Conceptualization, Operationalization, and Measurement of Machine Companionship: A Scoping Review

TL;DR

This scoping review systematically analyzes scholarly works on machine companionship, defining it as a positive, sustained, and coordinated human-machine connection that develops over time.

Contribution

It provides the first comprehensive synthesis and a formal definition of machine companionship based on existing literature and theoretical considerations.

Findings

Wide variation in concepts and measurements of MC

Identification of key properties: positive, sustained, co-active, autotelic

Over 50 different measured variables in studies

Abstract

The notion of machine companions has long been embedded in social-technological imaginaries. Recent advances in AI have moved those media musings into believable sociality manifested in interfaces, robotic bodies, and devices. Those machines are often referred to colloquially as "companions" yet there is little careful engagement of machine companionship (MC) as a formal concept or measured variable. This PRISMA-guided scoping review systematically samples, surveys, and synthesizes current scholarly works on MC (N = 71; 2017-2025), to that end. Works varied widely in considerations of MC according to guiding theories, dimensions of a-priori specified properties (subjectively positive, sustained over time, co-active, autotelic), and in measured concepts (with more than 50 distinct measured variables). WE ultimately offer a literature-guided definition of MC as an autotelic, coordinated connection between human and machine that unfolds over time and is subjectively positive.