User blog comment:The Milkman/Indoctrination Theorists Say the Darndest Things/@comment-94.14.57.203-20121021102428/@comment-24174486-20121021155751

The child is a prominent figure in Shepard's psyche; it likely saw that and took the form based on Shepard's perceptions of the child. Machines with mind-reading technology have been shown to exist in the Mass Effect universe, and the Leviathans do something similar in the Leviathan DLC.