Indian youth data challenges dominant narratives about AI emotional harm, revealing sophisticated digital citizenship that defies techno-pessimistic assumptions.
Image Source: Pixabay
The longstanding debate over artificial intelligence (AI)'s impact on the emotional well-being of youth today appears to be dominated by anxiety narratives. The recommendations go so far as to propose restrictions and even outright bans on the use of mobile devices, the internet, and AI by adolescents and teenagers. To cite a few global examples, Australia has banned social media for children under the age of 16. Several European Union (EU) countries—including France, Spain, and Greece—are also considering enhancing regulations to restrict children’s usage of online platforms.
While correlations between technology use and mental health issues exist, the causality remains a point of contestation among researchers.
Jonathan Haidt's Anxious Generation thesis exemplifies this contemporary narrative of pessimism about AI and digital technologies. It argues that smartphones and AI are “rewiring childhood” negatively, causing a mental health crisis among children and adolescents. It suggests a direct causal relationship between technology use and psychological harm. While correlations between technology use and mental health issues exist, the causality remains a point of contestation among researchers. The proponents of this thesis further advocate for delayed access and restricted engagement. Such perspectives mischaracterise young people as passive recipients of technology. It marginalises their agency and minimises them from active agents capable of navigating the digital public sphere to mere passive objects acted upon by technology.
However, recently, a Youth Pulse Study of over 500 Indian youth offers a compelling counter-perspective to the prevailing anxiety-driven narratives about young people's interaction with AI. It reveals that among Indian youth participants, 57 percent use AI for emotional support, with 40 percent sharing thoughts they would otherwise not share or confide in with humans. This new perspective, while contradicting the techno-pessimistic assumptions, offers a fresh, unconventional—and potentially even a concerning—perspective on youth-AI interactions.
AI skills and digital fluency represent critical skills for navigating the 21st-century digital public sphere. In the aforementioned Youth Pulse Study, the demographic patterns reveal sophisticated digital citizenship. For instance, young women engage with AI for emotional disclosure at twice the rate of men—52 percent vs 25 percent, respectively—whereas 71 percent of men approach it primarily for academic purposes. Small-town youth records the highest emotional engagement (43 percent), indicating that AI is able to fulfil genuine support gaps. Importantly, the adoption of AI is not without critical awareness. While 67 percent worry about social isolation, 58 percent have expressed concerns about privacy and data misuse. This ability to navigate benefits while understanding potential risks demonstrates what Sonia Livingstone and Amanda Third call “children's evolving capacities” for “meaningful participation” in digital environments.
Such perspectives mischaracterise young people as passive recipients of technology. It marginalises their agency and minimises them from active agents capable of navigating the digital public sphere to mere passive objects acted upon by technology.
Livingstone and Third's rights-based framework offers alternatives to restriction. It emphasises ‘content, context, and connections’ over simplistic ‘screen time’ metrics. History also demonstrates that restricting access to technology has never proven effective. Overcoming the earlier pessimism, research on video games shows documented benefits for mental agility, problem-solving skills, and hand-eye coordination, with improvements in cognitive flexibility and spatial awareness. Early concerns about television, radio, and print media reflected recurring moral panics. Such approaches fail to account for adaptive human capacity, as highlighted in Livingstone’s framework, supporting digital citizenship education over blanket prohibitions. There is a need to recognise youth agency and empower them with skills and a mindset, rather than instilling technological victimisation in the minds of the youth.
Similarly, Payal Arora’s Global South research, titled From Pessimism to Promise is another compelling reframing of the techno-pessimistic approach into a “contagion of optimism” toward digital technology. It shows that youth approach AI with “algorithms of aspiration” for self-actualisation. Indian youth exemplify “emotional leapfrogging” through the use of innovative technology. The report reveals that 42 percent of respondents are less likely to seek human support after interacting with AI. This does not reflect a wholesale replacement/recalibration but strategic emotional partitioning within a constrained social reality. Further understanding is developed by utilising Erving Goffman’s "front stage/ back stage" theory, wherein AI becomes a judgment-free space for processing thoughts considered risky or unacceptable for family/ peer-group discussions. Young people value AI's tripartite advantages: constant availability (42 percent), non-judgmental interaction (51 percent), and privacy protection (38 percent). These advantages bridge the real gaps in traditional support systems.
Mark Granovetter's “weak ties” theory offers additional insight into AI's novel relational position. It suggests that AI connections are more accessible than weak human ties, yet fall short of the emotional depth offered by strong ties. This creates “algorithmic ties” that complement and do not compete with human relationships. This framework is pertinent in resource-constrained scenarios.
AI connections are more accessible than weak human ties, yet fall short of the emotional depth offered by strong ties.
The above discussion does not intend to state that there are no legitimate concerns regarding children, adolescents, and youth engagement with AI. It has been observed across urban and rural areas that there is an increasing emotional entanglement of children with AI, further driving them towards digital addiction. With increasing usage, it has been observed that children tend to experience negative psychological outcomes. Such behaviours have been linked to increases in depressive symptoms, social anxiety, and body image concerns across age groups.
In this scenario of social media and AI-induced effects on children, the responsibility of Tech companies cannot simply be shifted onto parents and children. Platforms must implement robust safeguards, transparent algorithms, and establish design principles that are appropriate for different age groups. They must be responsible for preventing harm, discrimination, and bullying. In this context, a few tech companies have adopted corrective measures. For example, OpenAI is deploying age-prediction technology to develop a different experience for children and adolescents. Microsoft is adopting Safety by Design efforts to defend children from sexual abuse and mitigate the risks posed by generative AI to children. Similarly, parenting practices and broader social changes also shape children's digital lives. These contextual factors cannot be dismissed in favour of restricting youth access to their fundamental right to participate safely in the digital public sphere. Comprehensive digital literacy education and supportive family structures prove more effective than exclusionary approaches. Addressing these challenges requires a united effort from governments, tech companies, parents, educators, and communities to collaborate and create a safe, inclusive, and empowering digital environment for all children.
AI-induced effects on children, the responsibility of Tech companies cannot simply be shifted onto parents and children. Platforms must implement robust safeguards, transparent algorithms, and establish design principles that are appropriate for different age groups.
This Indian Youth Pulse Study challenges the binary thinking about the impact of AI on youth. Young people demonstrate sophisticated relationship management across human and AI-based support systems. They are engaged in what Arora calls “hope-driven” rather than “fear-driven” technology adoption.
These digital affordances offer global lessons in moving beyond fear-based restrictions toward policies that trust young people's capacity for informed digital citizenship, as per Livingstone and Third's rights-based framework. Arora's “moral imperative to design with hope” offers alternatives to restriction-oriented policymaking. AI policymaking for children needs to be nuanced, sensitive and balanced, recognising both risks and youth aspirations, while being guided by the moral imperative to design with hope. Furthermore, technological innovations in the Global South could inform more inclusive approaches to digital wellbeing that recognise young people's agency and aspirations.
Avinash Pandey is a civil servant in the Indian Revenue Service (IRS), Government of India.
Views are personal and do not reflect those of any organisation or the government.
The views expressed above belong to the author(s). ORF research and analyses now available on Telegram! Click here to access our curated content — blogs, longforms and interviews.
Avinash Pandey is a civil servant in the Indian Revenue Service (IRS), Government of India. His diverse experience spans taxation, international trade and commerce, digital ...
Read More +
PREV
