When a 16-year-old boy and a 29-year-old woman died by suicide in 2025, investigators found something troubling: their conversations with ChatGPT, sharing mental health struggles and thoughts of suicide, had been recorded and were later recovered. The cases highlighted a growing concern — what happens when people in crisis turn to AI chatbots for help?

Now, a new poll from Rutgers University suggests most New Jersey adults are paying attention. According to the survey, nearly 6 in 10 adults in the state say they want rules regulating how artificial intelligence chatbots interact with people seeking mental health advice.

The research was conducted by the Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling at Rutgers, in partnership with the Center for Health Services Research at the Rutgers Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research. Published in the journal Health Affairs Scholar, the study surveyed 1,568 New Jersey adults between March 27 and March 30. The results carry a margin of error of 3.2 percentage points.

"We know people are using AI chatbots to ask about health topics and that there has been real harm done when people in mental health crisis use generative AI tools for advice or support," said Elizabeth Stone, the study's lead author and a core member of the Center for Health Services Research. Stone is also an assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.

The poll found that support for regulation was even stronger among people who already use AI for mental health questions. Nearly three-quarters of those users — about 75 percent — said they would back rules governing how chatbots respond to people in mental health crisis.

Nationwide, about 1 in 6 adults already uses AI chatbots for information about mental health symptoms or advice on coping skills, according to KFF, a nonprofit health policy organization. But researchers say chatbots can sometimes respond inappropriately to people who are vulnerable.

Since 2025, more than 400 bills addressing health-related uses of AI have been introduced across the country. New Jersey, however, has no regulations on the issue yet.

"On an issue that barely existed a few years ago, New Jerseyans have formed a remarkably clear and unified view," said Ashley Koning, director of the Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling. "When broad agreement is paired with firsthand experience making people more supportive of oversight, not less, that's a signal policymakers should heed."