WASHINGTON – A new report from the American Psychological Association (APA) highlights the complex effects of artificial intelligence on adolescents,urging developers to prioritize safety features that protect young people from exploitation,manipulation,and the potential erosion of real-world relationships.

The report, titled “Artificial Intelligence and adolescent Well-being: An APA Health Advisory,” emphasizes the need for careful consideration as AI becomes increasingly integrated into daily life.”AI offers new efficiencies and opportunities, yet its deeper integration into daily life requires careful consideration to ensure that AI tools are safe, especially for adolescents,” the report states. “We urge all stakeholders to ensure youth safety is considered relatively early in the evolution of AI. It is critical that we do not repeat the same harmful mistakes made with social media.”

The report, crafted by an expert advisory panel, builds upon previous APA reports addressing social media use and healthy video content recommendations for adolescents.

The APA defines adolescence as spanning ages 10-25,emphasizing that age alone is “not a foolproof marker for maturity or psychological competence.” This period is crucial for brain development, necessitating specific safeguards for younger users.

“Like social media, AI is neither inherently good nor bad,” said APA Chief of Psychology Mitch Prinstein, PhD, who spearheaded the report’s development. “But we have already seen instances where adolescents developed unhealthy and even dangerous ‘relationships’ with chatbots, such as. Some adolescents may not even know they are interacting with AI,which is why it is indeed crucial that developers put guardrails in place now.”

Key Recommendations for adolescent AI Safety

“Like social media, AI is neither inherently good nor bad,” said APA chief of Psychology Mitch Prinstein, PhD.

The report outlines several recommendations to ensure adolescents can use AI safely:

• Ensuring healthy boundaries with simulated human relationships: Adolescents may be more susceptible than adults to accepting details from bots without questioning its accuracy or intent.
• Creating age-appropriate defaults: Privacy settings, interaction limits, and content should be tailored for different age groups, with transparency, human oversight, and rigorous testing.
• Encouraging AI uses that promote healthy development: AI can assist with brainstorming, summarizing, and synthesizing information, aiding students in understanding and retaining key concepts. However, awareness of AI’s limitations is crucial.
• Limiting access to harmful and inaccurate content: AI developers should implement protections to prevent adolescents’ exposure to such content.
• Protecting adolescents’ data privacy and likenesses: Limiting the use of their data for targeted advertising and sales to third parties is essential.

The report also advocates for comprehensive AI literacy education, integrating it into school curricula and developing national and state guidelines.

“Manny of these changes can be made immediately, by parents, educators and adolescents themselves,” Prinstein said. “Others will require more ample changes by developers, policymakers and other technology professionals.”