Children in England choosing ChatGPT over Parents for life advice
Technology plays a huge part in our everyday lives. Most of us would suddenly switch to panic mode if we accidentally leave our phone at home. Modern technology comes with incredible benefits and improves our quality of life, but it can also leave a negative impact on our mental health and our relationships if we’re not on guard. With the coming of the internet, communication and conversation become digital and through online.
The face to face concept became, well, a lost art. With the fast-paced advancement in technology, the emergence of AI or artificial intelligence, conversation is being taken yet again to another dimension. By this point, you’ve probably heard about ChatGPT, an AI-powered chatbot programmed to simulate human conversation. No software has ever been able to so convincingly provide human-like and detailed answers to inquiries before.
At the inaugural “Festival Of Childhood” on April 3, 2025 in England, Dame Rachel de Souza who is Children’s Commissioner for England has warned that children are increasingly turning to online chatbots instead of their parents for answers to life’s biggest questions. She said that the “apathy” of many parents is causing a “crisis in childhood” that is leading to many children feeling “disconnected.”
The Children’s Commissioner said: “Artificial intelligence such as Chat GPT could end up filling knowledge gaps for children unless parents can show they will respond quicker than online chatbots.” Her comments come amid a national conversation about how the internet and social media are affecting children, which has been prompted by the hit Netflix drama Adolescence.
Dame Rachel warned that childhood must not be conflated with adulthood ‘because to do so abdicates us of our responsibility to making sure every child has all the things they should always have, and no child experiences the things they never should’. She said: “If we want children to experience the vivid technicolor of life, the joy of childhood, the innocence of youth, we have to prove that we will respond more quickly to them than Chat GPT.”
She further said: “Some of these foundations of childhood are cracking. A different version of childhood is playing out — one that we are struggling to be honest about. A crisis developing in childhood.” Dame Rachel added: “There is a risk of inaction, of apathy — and the antidote to this is listening. Connecting. That is why we must listen to children, to engage them on the decisions about their lives.”
The Children’s Commissioner has also carried out a new survey using her statutory powers to obtain responses from around 19,000 schools and colleges, representing almost 90% of schools in England.
Reference: Children are turning to ChatGPT over their PARENTS for life advice
