Investigating How Emerging Adults Explore Identity through Writing: Opportunities for AI Writing Assistants to Help

Emerging adults (EAs) often struggle with their identity, making them vulnerable to mental health issues. This paper examines how EAs explore their identity through life-story writing, with an eye on how AI assistants might help. Our interviews with 25 emerging adults and people in their support networks revealed that mandatory, external-audience-facing life-story writing---such as personal statements for college applications---often triggered EAs' identity exploration. These identity exploration processes were highly collaborative. The collaborations succeeded when all involved parties---the EAs, their peers, parents, mentors, and counselors---had the tactics and confidence to have intimate conversations about one's identity. When human collaboration failed, EAs turned to AI assistants instead. These findings offer an alternative perspective to the common AI mental well-being assistant design, which assumes writers write about their lives proactively and privately. Instead, we suggest AI might help more effectively if it serves as a connective tissue and enhances young people's support network.