UK Children Are Acting on AI Advice at High Rates, Study Finds

The findings echo other similar studies in recent months that point to an increasing use of artificial intelligence for companionship and guidance.

A teenage girl looks at her smartphone. Geobor/Shutterstock

Children in the UK are going to artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots for advice, with 86 percent saying they have acted on guidance given to them by a chatbot, a survey published on Feb. 10 suggests.

The poll, commissioned by British mobile phone network Vodafone, found that 37 percent of 11- to 16-year-olds say they are confiding in chatbots, including asking for their advice on friendships (23 percent) and mental health issues (16 percent).

Nearly one-quarter (24 percent) turn to AI for advice in difficult situations, and one in five (20 percent) do so to get help with anxieties and worries.

The study, which analyzed the experiences of 2,000 children and their parents, pointed to a high prevalence of AI in young people’s lives, with 81 percent of 11- to 16-year-olds saying they use chatbots and 42 percent saying they use them every day.

Findings also pointed to young people confiding in AI and seeing it as some kind of companion.

One in three (33 percent) said they had shared something with AI that they otherwise would not have told their friends, parents, or teachers.

Almost one-third (31 percent) of respondents say the AI feels like one of their friends, with 49 percent saying this is because the chatbot is trustworthy.

“More than half (56 percent) of 11- [to] 16-year-olds surveyed feel that AI chatbot interactions can sometimes blur the line between what’s real and what’s not, with boys more likely than girls to feel a chatbot is a friend (41 percent vs 24 percent),” the survey found.

Bonding With Chatbots

The report says that this trend of children “bonding” with chatbots is due to AI increasingly being designed to display human-like traits. The findings suggest that large proportions of those children who use chatbots misunderstand the technology’s ability to empathize, with 39 percent believing AI understands emotions the same way people do.

“It is uncanny how effective AI chatbots can be at mimicking human empathy, personality, and connection. As Vodafone’s research shows, this is leading many children and young people to feel like chatbots are their friends and is interfering with their social development,” child psychologist Elly Hanson said.

“They need real relationships involving give-and-take, shared experience, diverse perspectives, and actual feelings, not pseudo-relationships designed to keep them hooked for as long as possible.”

The findings echo similar studies published in recent months that point to an increasing use of AI for companionship and guidance.

A December study from the AI Security Institute (AISI) found that one in three (33 percent) of Britons had used AI for “emotional support”—a proportion that the government-backed body called a “substantial minority.”

The AISI said in its report published on Dec. 18 that many of the societal impacts of AI “are already here,” noting that its research “suggests that some users are beginning to form emotional dependencies on AI models.”