64% of Teenagers Say They Use AI Chatbots as Psychological Well being Considerations Mount

Roughly two-thirds of American teenagers aged 13 to 17 say they use AI chatbots, in accordance with a brand new examine by Pew Analysis Heart, with three-in-ten saying that they use them every day.

Going even past every day use, 16% of teenagers reported that they use AI chatbots “a number of instances a day” or “nearly continually.”

ChatGPT was by far probably the most extensively used chatbot, according to the report, with 59% saying they use it. The subsequent mostly used ones have been Google’s Gemini at 23% and Meta AI at 20%. Anthropic’s Claude was the least in style chatbot amongst teenagers, with solely 3% of respondents saying that they use it.

The examine’s demographic findings have been additionally fascinating. Extra Black and Hispanic teenagers reported utilizing AI chatbots than White teenagers, and ChatGPT use was extra frequent amongst teenagers in higher-income households, whereas lower- and middle-income teenagers have been extra doubtless to make use of Character.AI.

The findings come as using synthetic intelligence amongst minors has turn into one of the controversial subjects plaguing the {industry} this 12 months.

OpenAI has been pushed to implement security guardrails like parental controls and automated “age-appropriate” settings for minors, following a wrongful death lawsuit filed earlier this 12 months. Within the lawsuit, a California couple accused ChatGPT of helping the suicide of their 16-year-old son, Adam Raine.

Following Raine’s demise on April 11, 2025, his mother and father uncovered conversations with ChatGPT going again months, during which the chatbot suggested him on suicide strategies, helped him write a suicide letter, and even discouraged Raine from letting his mother and father know of his suicidal ideation.

The Raine household’s tragedy got here months after an analogous incident, during which a Florida mother sued Character.AI after one of many firm’s chatbots instructed her 14-year-old son to “come house to me as quickly as potential,” shortly earlier than he killed himself.

The American Psychological Association warned the FTC concerning the situation in a gathering in February, urging the company to handle using AI chatbots as unlicensed therapists, saying that it significantly endangered weak teams like kids and teenagers “who lack the expertise to precisely assess dangers.”

AI chatbots have additionally been below intense scrutiny over inappropriate conversations with minors. Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri opened a probe into Meta in August over a Reuters report that discovered the tech big had allowed its chatbots to have interaction in “sensual” chats with kids.

Sen. Hawley has since launched the GUARD Act in Congress, a bipartisan invoice that may drive AI firms to institute age verification to dam minors. The invoice simply secured extra cosponsors on Tuesday, displaying that the difficulty is gaining momentum in D.C., even because the Trump administration has made its intentions clear in terms of permitting AI firms to take pleasure in a a lot lighter and extra industry-friendly regulatory atmosphere.

The Pew examine additionally appeared into teenagers’ use of social media, with an awesome majority saying that they use social media a minimum of a number of instances a day. In line with the report, about one-in-five teenagers mentioned that they use TikTok and YouTube—the 2 hottest social media apps amongst teenagers—”nearly continually.”

The damaging psychological and bodily well being results of spending probably the most adolescence of your life glued to a display screen have been properly documented. Particularly relating to social media, quite a few studies have linked elevated utilization to despair, anxiousness, consideration deficit, and extra.

Regulators around the globe are more and more being attentive to this. As of Wednesday, Australia started enacting a first-of-its-kind social media ban for youths below the age of 16. Different governments, particularly Denmark, Malaysia, Norway, and the European Parliament, have shared plans to comply with go well with.