Business Finance Media Technology Policy Wealth Insights Interviews

Art Art Fairs Art Market Art Reviews Auctions Galleries Museums Interviews

Lifestyle Nightlife & Dining Style Travel Interviews

Power Index Nightlife & Dining Art A.I. PR

About About Observer Advertise With Us Reprints

Before Kids Learn to Think, They’re Learning to Prompt

As A.I. enters classrooms and homes, the real risk isn’t misinformation but the quiet erosion of developing thinking skills.

Almost a year ago, on the way to soccer practice, my six-year-old asked a question that felt both innocent and quietly inevitable: “Dad, where does ChatGPT live?” Like many children encountering generative A.I. for the first time, he was trying to place it in the world by giving it a location, a biography and a set of boundaries. That instinct matters. Long before children understand how A.I. systems work, they relate to them socially: asking questions, seeking explanations and attributing knowledge, agency and even personality to these tools that respond fluently and with confidence. 

Sign Up For Our Daily Newsletter

Thank you for signing up!

By clicking submit, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge we may use your information to send you emails, product samples, and promotions on this website and other properties. You can opt out anytime.

For parents, educators and policymakers, the question is not whether children will interact with generative A.I.—they already are—but rather how those interactions shape formative minds when reasoning, writing and judgment are still being formed. 

My concerns had been simmering long before my son’s query brought them to a boil: What effect would these new tools have on the mind of an impressionable six-year-old? What changes, mundane and grand, would they give rise to in a world he was only beginning to understand? And, finally, what responsibilities did I have as his father to protect and guide him through the very technology that I helped advance in my role as the CEO of an A.I. company?

The unease around generative A.I.—and its impact on children—is not unique to technology founders or practitioners. Parents, educators and policymakers have all converged around shared concerns about what children should be taught about these systems and what limits, if any, should govern their use. 

Such concerns have become more pronounced as major platforms like OpenAI have moved generative A.I. closer to everyday use. Over the past year, leading models have gained stronger memory, conversational richness and enhanced reasoning, which increase utility for adults while deepening attachment risks for children. 

Every generation, it must be said, laments the negative effects of emerging technologies on younger minds. Radio, calculators, television and even the internet were all once framed as problematic novelties before becoming everyday tools. Generative A.I. differs in a critical respect insofar as it can supplant the act of thinking itself. For children still learning how to reason, write and wrestle with ideas, the concern is clear: what happens when cognitive effort is outsourced before it has been fully developed?

Before grappling with this topic, it is useful to begin with a broader and better-documented question: what does existing evidence tell us about how generative A.I. is already shaping adult cognition? 

Generative A.I. and adult cognition 

The effects of generative A.I. on professional knowledge workers have been thoroughly examined, including a widely cited study by Microsoft Research. Among its central findings is that while generative tools can increase efficiency on particular tasks, their unchecked use can reduce critical thinking. 

The authors describe a phenomenon they term mechanized convergence: users relying on generative systems tend to produce narrower, less diverse outputs than those working independently. A........

© Observer