How is AI shaping young lives? 

19 May 2026

We can’t escape the rise of AI, but in this fast-paced world of chat and empathy bots, it’s hard to know how to keep up, and most importantly keep the young people we work with safe. In this masterclass heard from speakers who are exploring the issues that affect young people when it comes to AI, looking at how it is affecting the youth culture of today, and how we can use AI in a safe, and creative way with young people. 

Reflections from our host, Clare Murphy: 

In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few. 
– Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind 

I entered this masterclass feeling very much like a beginner. What did I, a storyteller, know about AI? I felt lucky that we had three impressive speakers who have been working in the field a while and could illuminate my mind on the subject. I learned so much in two hours and ended up leaving the conversation feeling very full of courage.  

We had Nicki Watts from AI Youth, Tania Duarte from We And AI and Nicola Fox Hamilton, a cyber psychologist and founder of podcast InBits- a discussion on all things cyber/tech.  

We unpacked many things in our two hours. We started with the elephant in the room, AI. “Artificial intelligence” the phrase we learned is a marketing tool designed to sell a product. In truth what we currently have are Large Language Models that can respond to being asked a question by trolling through all the stolen data that was taken from the internet and cobble together an answer. This is known as generative AI, that is an algorithm that tries to appear sentient by using language like “I’m thinking…” while it sifts through website data to generate an answer that you will agree with. 

We talked about the recent GROK discussions on the national news, and how young people felt disgusted, not by GROK but by the fact that they had been dealing with apps that take off their clothing in any image for years, and the government and adults are only now catching up. The government’s response is to ban social media for kids, rather than deal with the companies selling AI. AI has become the new snake oil.  

We also discussed the fact that many of us adults will often avoid talking to young people about AI because they feel they, the adults, don’t know enough. By not talking to the young people, we make them more vulnerable and susceptible to manipulation. It’s akin to not talking to your teenagers until they’re 15 about porn, when, chances are, that they will have seen a lot of porn by then. Conversation without shame or derision is key to opening up a real dialogue around AI usage and how to cope. 

We opened up the discussion on relationships with chatbots, whether for therapy or friendship and how they most often can spiral into something negative. The sycophantic nature of AI lends itself to reducing the human’s ability to cope with real human situations where there is conflict. AI can provide endless reassurance but also can set unrealistic standards for human relationships.  

There is a world to discover, an emerging world where we need to understand more about “AI”, use the appropriate language and find ways to engage in conversations about what is happening for our young people. 

Speakers’ Top Take-Aways

From Tania Duarte:

  1. The term ‘AI’ was originally created as a marketing term to get investment. There is no agreed definition and it is now used to refer to so many things that communication is often meaningless and nebulous. Talk about the specific technologies or use cases.
  2. Don’t describe AI in human terms as it gives false ideas about the capabilities while simultaneously hiding human decision making and responsibility. This includes thinking about the metaphors and analogies which creep into language about AI. AI doesn’t ‘think’ or ‘know’, and given the dangerous interactions young people are encouraged to develop with AI chabots this needs to be front of mind.
  3. Based on research we have done, the harms which young people may encounter while interacting with chatbots are not limited to overdependency, addiction and emotional manipulation. There are a range of others such as data exploitation and loss of privacy, exposure to sexual content, false information and misinformation, financial exploitation, impact on critical thinking, negative impact on real relationships, language standardisation, physical and psychological harm, propagation of demographic bias. Solving one of these issues doesn;t address the bigger picture.
  4. Discourse about Ai should not start with how to adopt it best/ most sfaely/ ethically. It should start with questioning whether people even need or want to use it. There are many ways people are standing up for the values and interests of their communities and the wonder planet by resisting, refusing, reclaiming and reimagining AI. Keep space for refusal as a valid option, especially considering how people might feel about topics such as environmental harm, labour exploitation and data tehft.
  5. In summary, remember 5 key principles about AI: AI isn’t like a human, AI isn’t always right, AI isn’t neutral, AI is not the answer to everything, AI is not inevitable.

From Nicki Watts:

  1. Create curious, judgement-free spaces: Young people say that an attraction of using generative AI is that it is non-judgemental. This is a strong indicator that they welcome these judgement-free spaces in their day-to-day lives. Offering creative and curious spaces for young people to explore this issue without fear of judgement is something uniquely human we can offer through our practice.
  2. Try it yourself: A lot of these systems are currently free to use. If you want to better understand the experience of young people, play with the technology yourself. Knowing what it truly feels like to use the apps the young people in your life are using means you can hold a more informed conversation, and have a better understanding of what might be exciting, challenging, or upsetting about using it.
  3. Connect AI to your safeguarding practice: AI technologies link with our safeguarding practices in a range of ways, and ensuring they are now part of your consideration is important. This isn't a separate concern, it sits within the work you're already doing.
  4. Don't worry if you feel behind, everyone does!: Keeping up with new generative AI tech, the jargon, and the new ways people are using it feels completely impossible. But if we respect that young people's lived experience is growing up with this technology, there is great opportunity for learning together and supporting their peer education too.
  5. Doing nothing is still a choice: We are all making a choice right now about how much or how little we engage with learning about this technology. If we shut off completely, we may miss key opportunities to support young people and to be recognised as a safe person to turn to when they experience something troubling as a result of their use of it.

Our top-takeaways from Nicola:

  1. It is important to understand both the positive and negative aspects of AI and other technologies. We also need to be familiar with it ourselves if we are going to being able to educate young people on how to engage with it safely.
  2. AI does have its positives, especially when used in medicine, for example finding new ways to use existing medicine to treat different health problems. But when it comes to creativity, we should be much more wary. It can be used as a starting point but it also stifles our creativity, reducing creative confidence, and stops us thinking for ourselves. Our brain is a muscle, you have to keep working it.
  3. There are limitations to AI in creativity and originality, it has inherent biases, and there is a risks of over-reliance on it, especially in education and creative fields.
  4. Often adults don’t feel equipped to talk to young people about AI or social media, but if you are afraid to talk to your kids about it, they won’t feel like they can talk to you about it either. It is important to have open conversations about what they’re experiencing, approaching it with curiosity rather than just negativity, which don’t feel like interrogations.
  5. There is a lot of anxiety around AI replacing jobs. There have been a lot of layoffs, and layoffs are still happening, but some companies have realised that the AI they’re using is quite problematic and doesn’t have the nuance of humans and so are bringing people back.

Resources:

These resources were shared by speakers and participants during the masterclass:

Suggested action for going forward from Nicki Watts:

Speak to a young person about generative AI. Don’t let your feelings of being behind or not knowledgeable enough stop you from giving them the opportunity to share what they are experiencing with you, let them be the expert.

Further resources from A New Direction:

Download Safeguarding and Gen AI: Photography of Children resource

Read Disrupting image representation in the Age of AI blog

Read Protecting participants in the Age of AI blog

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