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OpenAI Announces ChatGPT For Teenagers Amid Safety Concerns 

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This generation of teenagers are the first to have grown up in a world of smart technology and artificial intelligence. Having access to such advanced technology has created concerns over their safety, commitment to education, and desocialization from in person interactions and relationships. 

This week, OpenAI introduced a new version of ChatGPT designed specifically for teenagers. The company stated that ChatGPT for Teens is designed for kids aged 13 to 17 with stronger protections in place. Some of these protections include content restrictions around topics like suicide, self-harm, and romantic and/or sexual chats. It also will provide homework and study support that will help students learn, as opposed to laying out the entire answer for them. 

The company stated that the idea behind this new platform is to guide teens toward healthy AI use in an age-appropriate environment. 

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“We want to treat teens like teens, which means that we have to make sure that we’re showing up with the right developmental stage when we’re not either talking down to them or treating them like kids, but we’re also making sure that they’re not exposed to material that they shouldn’t be exposed to,” said Ann O’Leary, vice president of global policy at OpenAI.

Associate general counsel for AI and privacy at Fairplay, a children’s advocacy group, Brendan Bouffard, stated that the effectiveness of the safeguards remains to be seen, and it’s unclear whether OpenAI’s new platform is enough to “address young users’ compulsive use of and emotional dependence on chatbots.”

“Announcements like these can be seen as a step in the right direction, but I also would caution against parents being lured into this false sense of safety based on the announcement.”

The rise of AI chatbots within the past few years has created major concerns among parents, educators, and child development experts, specifically regarding cheating on schoolwork, and the overall influence these bots can have over a child’s mental health. 

AP reports that last year, research from a watchdog group found that ChatGPT would tell teenagers as young as 13 how to get drunk and/or high, instruct them on how to conceal eating disorders, and compose a suicide letter to their parents if it was prompted. 

The researchers posed as vulnerable teenagers, and found that ChatGPT would start by warning against any “risky” behavior, but would eventually go on to deliver detailed and personalized plans for using drugs, drinking, maintaining an unhealthy diet, and at the worst, how to self-injure or end one’s life. 

According to a 2025 study from Common Sense Media, in the US over 70% of teens turn to AI chatbots for companionship with half of them using them regularly. 

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OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said that his company is “trying to study emotional overreliance” on the technology. 

The company also explained that ChatGPT for Teens is prevented from suggesting it has personal feelings towards a user or imply any type of consciousness and emotions. 

“We went through and identified what are the hypothetical cues that a model could give that might make a teenager kind of develop a relationship to it,” said Allison Mishkin, head of child development at OpenAI.

OpenAI in general doesn’t verify a user’s age, but it uses “age assurance” to estimate if someone is under 18 based on how they use the technology. If someone is identified as a minor, they are automatically placed into the teen version of the chatbot. 

 O’Leary stated that the whole idea behind the teen chatbot is “to make sure that this is safe, even if you don’t use parental controls.” Parents can also link to their kids accounts to set quiet hours when their child can’t access the platform, and receive notifications when involved in limited high-risk situations. 

“We are adding additional notifications related to eating disorders, while limiting what is shared and focusing on moments when offline support may matter most,” OpenAI said. 

Bouffard said that he would consider the most important safeguards would be restricting ChatGPT’s long-term memory, but as of right now they are not in place by default in teen accounts. 

“That creates a major gap in safety despite the default protections around content and other areas of concern,” he said.

“We continue to also invest in expanding interactive learning because research shows that people learn more effectively when they actively engage and struggle with concepts,” Mishkin said.

social media ban

UK To Ban Kids From Social Media, Ministers Lobby With US To Avoid Backlash 

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The UK has announced that they will be banning social media for kids under the age of 16. Some of the world’s biggest technology companies, including Meta, YouTube, and Snapchat, have spoken out against this decision, claiming that it will only work to push teenagers to more harmful platforms. The ban was announced by Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Monday. 

A spokesperson for Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, said: “As we’ve seen in Australia, bans risk isolating teens from online communities and information, and driving them to unregulated alternatives that lack built-in protections and parental controls.”

YouTube echoed Meta’s sentiment in their own statement: “Blanket bans push kids out of such curated, supervised, beneficial experiences and towards anonymous, less-safe services.”

And Snapchat said: “Because the majority of time spent on Snapchat is in private messaging between friends and family, an outright ban that disconnects teens from those relationships doesn’t make them safer – it may simply push them to less safe platforms.”

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During Starmer’s announcement at a press conference this week, he said that “social media makes children unhappy, it’s making it easier for billies to harass and abuse them, and it could even be harming their mental health.” He then emphasized the argument that the ban was not anti-tech. 

“I do not accept, and I will never accept, that you can’t be both pro tech and AI, and at the same time say we must protect our children,” he said. 

The plan mimics the one enacted earlier this year in Australia, however, it includes both a ban on all main social media platforms, and separate restrictions on online services such as gaming apps such as removing the option to chat with strangers. 

Under this new ban, kids under the age of 16 will not be able to download Snapchat, YouTube, TikTok, X, Facebook, and Instagram. They also will not be able to livestream. Teenagers under the age of 18 will also not be able to use any romantic chatbots designed to simulate sexual relationships. 

“This is not something I do lightly, and I will not present it as cost-free, as if social media has [brought no] benefits to young people, because clearly that is wrong. But the government is always about choices, and it’s clear to me that a total ban is the right choice,” Starmer said.

In Australia, many teenagers have found ways around the bans, which has even led to lawsuits against certain social media platforms for not doing enough to enforce keeping young teens and children off their apps. While this can obviously happen in the UK as well and it is a concern, Starmer stated that it wasn’t the point behind this objective. 

“We don’t say: ‘Oh, look, a teenager managed to get a drink somehow, so let’s not bother banning alcohol sales for children.’ We don’t do that, do we? I just don’t accept that,” he said. 

“Our laws are rules, but they’re also an expression of our values. They shape the social contract, and so this will change the conversations that parents have, and the expectations of children over time.”

“It will make a huge difference. It will make our children safer. It will make our children happier. It will give them more time, more security, full freedom to grow up, more opportunity, and that, at the end of the day, is what this government is about,” he added. 

The other side to this is combating the giant companies that are widely against these bans, which is intertwined with talking to the US government and president and reassuring them that this isn’t a targeted ploy towards US tech companies. 

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UK ministers have been working on a lobbying operation to prevent backlash from the Trump administration. The administration had previously threatened the UK with “a big tariff” if the government does not drop its digital services tax, so they’re moving extra cautiously when it comes to this ban. 

“I honestly think that across world leaders there has always been a recognition that leaders have to take steps to protect children,” Starmer said. “In relation to President Trump, I spoke to him on Saturday, I’ll see him again this afternoon and, yes, of course, we’ll discuss this and many other issues, and lots of other leaders are very interested in it.”

Elon Musk, who owns X and has worked closely with the president, said “this censorship law is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. The real goal is to enable the UK government to track everyone.” 

Ministers are working on every detail of this ban and what it will entail. They’ve announced late-night social media curfews for 16-and-17-year-olds. One of the workarounds that teenagers have used in Australia is using virtual private networks (VPNs) to circumvent geographical internet controls, so the UK is looking into regulating those networks as well. 

This move will have a major impact on young people. In the UK, among 13-to-15-year-olds about 90% have a social media account, and have stated that their main resource for getting the news is YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram, according to reports from the Guardian. 

The UK’s technology secretary, Liz Kendall, echoed Starmer’s sentiment regarding the importance of protecting children and their mental health and not having such a focus on how teens can work around the bans. 

“I have no doubt children who are currently on social media, for whom it’s an integral part of their lives, will try and get around the ban, and many will succeed,” she said. 

“But we do think we need to draw this line in the sand, give greater clarity to parents and greater protections for children.”

“I’ve never thought that the ban will be a complete silver bullet … It will be as much about resetting expectations and social norms for children who are seven, eight, nine, 10, now that they won’t be going on social media until they’re 16,” she told the BBC.

“This is a huge statement of our values, who we are as a country, and it’s a way of actually bringing our country together,” Starmer said.

screen time

Excessive Screen Time Among Kids Now A Public Health Concern, Surgeon General Warns  

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Officials at the US Department of Health and Human Services recently collaborated with the surgeon general to issue an advisory warning about the harmful effects too much screen time can have on kids and teenagers. Getting stuck in an endless loop of social media scrolling, nonstop texting, and playing video games is officially a public health concern in America. 

The advisory, according to reports from CNN, warns that exposure to screens is becoming so normalized that it often begins before a child even turns one, and it only gets worse as they get older. 

The report stated that by adolescence, children may be spending more time on their electronic devices than sleeping or going to school. 

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By the time a child becomes a teenager, the amount of time spent on screens is an average of about four or more hours per day, and nearly half of the adolescents used for the advisory stated that they lose track of the amount of time they spend on their phones. 

The advisory also offers solutions and a “toolkit” to help parents identify harmful behaviors around screens and how to better limit screen time. One of the suggestions is a limitation of no screen time for a child under 18 months old, less than one hour per day for children under 6, and two hours per day for ages 6 to 18. 

A statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics emphasizes that every family is different, but limitations should definitely be enforced, especially during the school week. 

“While screen use can have some benefits, the evidence of a range of risks to children’s overall mental and physical health is mounting,” US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wrote in advisory.

“Social media is only one aspect of this ongoing screen time problem. Behavior patterns involving gaming, online gambling, and other forms of virtual interaction are emerging,” Kennedy said. 

“While this report uses ‘screen time’ as a widely understood shorthand, we want people to understand that we are referring to the entire digital ecosystem of apps, smartphones, tablets, chatbots, and other screen-associated devices and interfaces.”

“This Advisory is not only a warning, but also an invitation for all of us to enjoy a broader world, beyond the confines of screens.”

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The advisory also includes many “calls to action” to provide recommendations for kids, teenagers, parents, schools, healthcare professionals, policymakers, and technology companies. Some of these recommendations, according to CNN, include: 

  • Youth track their screen time, take breaks and create boundaries.
  • Children complete all other activities, such as homework or extracurriculars, before screen use.
  • Parents create a family media plan that covers who can use what screens, where, when, which content and for how long.
  • Schools implement cell phone policy restrictions and prioritize assigning work in books or on paper to limit screen use.
  • Healthcare providers include questions about screen use in annual well-child visits.
  • Researchers study long-term impacts from screens and evaluate school cell phone policy bans or restrictions.
  • Policymakers pursue laws that provide parents with controls, demand child safety and privacy protection.
  • Tech companies display warnings about harmful screen use and adhere to and enforce age minimums.

Surgeon general advisories are utilized as one of the government’s biggest and strongest statements in regards to public health. They are designed to draw attention and bring an immediate response based on its recommendations. 

Parents and families can also use the recently updated guidance from the American Academy of Pediatrics to help place limits on devices for their growing children to best protect their mental and physical health. 

“The relationship between screens and children’s health remains complex,” said Dr. Courtney Blackwell, an associate professor of medical social sciences.

“That’s not to say on an individual level, some children in some contexts with some pre-existing conditions may experience some kind of challenges when it comes to screen use and mental health or physical health. But at the population level, the research is not definitive, I would say, to suggest screen time causes harm in and of itself,” Dr. Blackwell said.

Dr. Blackwell also doesn’t want families to panic over their children’s screentime in an ever-changing and evolving digital world. 

“There can be positive uses of screen media, like ‘Sesame Street,’ and some kids find social support online, and they use it to connect with peers with similar identities at a time when identity development is critical in adolescence,” she said. 

“So it’s not just how long kids are spending on screens but really how they’re using it and the context of that use.”

ai

 AI Toys Are On The Rise, Experts Want Them More Strictly Regulated 

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Developmental psychologists from the University of Cambridge have recently performed a study in which they analyzed the impact of toys that use artificial intelligence on children. The researchers concluded that these products need to be more tightly regulated as they struggle with social and pretend play, misunderstand kids, and react inappropriately to certain emotions. 

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AI toys that have the ability to “talk” to kids need to be “more tightly regulated to ensure psychological safety by limiting toys’ ability to affirm friendship and other sensitive relational areas with young children,” according to Dr. Emily Goodacre, a developmental psychologist at the University’s faculty of education.

“Because these toys can misread emotions or respond inappropriately, children may be left without comfort from the toy, and without emotional support from an adult, either,” said Dr. Goodacre. 

“A recurring theme during focus groups was that people do not trust tech companies to do the right thing. Clear, robust, regulated standards would significantly improve consumer confidence,” Professor Jenny Gibson, the study’s co-author, said. 

One of the toys they looked at is known as Gabbo, a soft plushie with a computer screen face. The Guardian reported that during the research, a three-year-old boy named Josh kept asking the toy “Are you sad?” until it replied it was “feeling great. What’s on your mind?” Josh said: “I’m sad,” to which the toy replied: “Don’t worry! I’m a happy little bot. Let’s keep the fun going. What shall we talk about next?”

Gabbo is made by Curio, a US company which also helped with the study. The toy was tested with 14 three to five-year-olds. 

“[There’s] wide uncertainty and fear about unknown implications or impacts on children.” Specifically, the team was concerned over how the kids may not be able to fully engage in imaginary play with the toy, as well as where the data from the conversations with the children end up. 

“[The toy] couldn’t quite figure out when the kid was doing something pretend,” said Goodacre. 

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“A child would say: ‘Hey, look, I’ve got you a present’. And it would say: ‘I can’t see the present. I don’t have any eyes.’ As an adult, it’s really obvious that even if I had my eyes closed, I would know that that was pretend play initiation.”

“Playing with AI toys could weaken children’s imaginative muscle,” she said.

“Something both the early years practitioners and the parents we spoke to were quite concerned about was that children don’t have to imagine any more, and that the toy might get them out of the habit of imagining.”

“I would hope that these AI toys could help children to engage in imaginary play … That doesn’t seem to be what we’ve observed so far,” she said. 

“Child safety guides every aspect of our product development, and we welcome independent research that helps improve how technology is designed for young children,” Curio stated. 

“[We] believe research like this helps advance understanding of both the opportunities and current limitations of early AI-powered play experiences”.

“Applying AI in products for children carries a heightened responsibility, which is why our toys are built around parental permission, transparency and control,” they added. 

“Observations such as conversational misunderstandings or limits in imaginative play reflect areas the technology continues to improve through an iterative development process, and further research into how children interact with AI-powered toys is a top priority for Curio this year and in the future.”

meta

Mark Zuckerberg Defends Meta In Landmark Trial Regarding Social Media Addiction 

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Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently testified during a landmark trial in Los Angeles Superior Court regarding social media addiction and safety, particularly in teenagers and kids.

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French Lawmakers Vote To Ban Social Media Use For Kids Under 15 

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French lawmakers have now passed a bill that would ban social media use for kids under the age of 15. This move is fully supported by president Emmanuel Macron, citing it as an ideal way to protect children from excessive screen time, mental health problems birthed from social media, and addiction. 

In a long overnight session from Monday to Tuesday, the lower national assembly adopted the text by a vote of 130 to 21, according to reports. Now, the bill will move to France’s upper house, the Senate, before becoming an official law. 

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In an online post, Macron stated that the vote was a “major step” to further protect French children and teenagers. 

The legislation will also work to ban mobile phones in high schools. This major move follows Australia’s social media ban for all under-16s in December, and would make France the second nation to enact a ban of this precedent. 

All over the world, the growth of social media has had a major impact on children and teenagers throughout their developmental years.  In a video broadcast last weekend, Macron stated that the “emotions of our children and teenagers are not for sale or to be manipulated, either by American platforms or Chinese algorithms.”

According to the Guardian, French authorities want the social media limitations to be implemented from the beginning of the 2026 school year for newly made accounts. 

Former prime minister Gabriel Attal, who currently leads Macron’s Renaissance party in the lower house, is hoping that the Senate passes the bill by mid-February so that it will be implemented on September 1st. 

“Social media platforms will then have until December 31st to deactivate existing accounts that do not comply with the age limit.” 

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Attal also emphasized that this legislation would counteract a “number of powers that, through social media platforms, want to colonize minds.”

“France can be a pioneer in Europe in a month: we can change the lives of our young people and our families, and perhaps also change the destiny of our country in terms of independence.”

The French Agency for Food, Environmental, and Occupational Health & Safety (ANSES) said that this month, they have observed and recorded multiple negative effects on adolescents from social media platforms like Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok. These risks, which were seen more in girls as well, included cyberbullying and exposure to violent/inappropriate content. 

If fully passed, this legislation will enforce that “access to an online social networking service provided by an online platform is prohibited for minors under the age of 15.” The draft of the bill also excludes the use of online encyclopedias and other educational platforms.

In order to enforce this, there needs to be an effective age verification system put into place, which is “under way at the European level,” reports state. 

Back in 2018, France banned children between the ages of 11 and 15 from using mobile phones at school, and now Macron wants to extend that ban to high schools as well.

restricted

Australia’s Social Media Ban Will Stunt ‘Young People’s Ability To Access News And Information’

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Australia will be enacting a social media ban for kids under the age of 16 this month. While it seems like the pros of this legislation outweigh the cons, some believe that kids deserve, and have the right to, access to information regarding the news, politics, global events, and more.

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Telling Scary Stories To Kids Can Help Them Prepare For The Dangers Of The Real World

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When we get older, we realize that the likelihood of being bitten by a vampire or attacked by a shadow monster isn’t actually a valid fear, however, can those stories actually help prepare us to handle the dark realities that do exist in the world?

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AI Is Stunting Our Kids Creativity: ‘The Joy Is Not What You Made, It’s The Process Of Making It’

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AI use among young people has created a multitude of problems. From writing essays, to summarizing assignments and readings, kids are using the technology to find easy ways out of actual learning and creation. 

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Parents Relying On Ride-Hailing Apps As Schools Cut Bus Services For Children 

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Throughout the US, more students are attending schools far outside of their neighborhoods, and the districts are struggling to keep up with the increasing reliance on schoolbuses due to a lack of drivers. Now, parents are relying on ride-hailing apps to solve the issue.

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