How kids feel about AI, in their own words
How kids feel about AI, in their own words
孩子们如何看待人工智能：他们的心声
When we set out to talk to kids about artificial intelligence, we thought we knew what we’d hear. We expected some to tell us they were using it to cheat a little, the way Millennials and Gen Xers opened up CliffsNotes or programmed formulas into their TI-82s, and others to share inspiring ways they were using it. We were also listening for concerns that were less kid-specific, like deepfakes or job destruction. 当我们着手与孩子们探讨人工智能时，我们以为自己已经预知了答案。我们预想一些孩子会告诉我们，他们正用它来“小作弊”一下，就像千禧一代和X世代当年翻阅《CliffsNotes》（学习指南）或将公式输入TI-82计算器一样；我们也预想其他人会分享他们使用AI的启发性方式。我们同时也关注那些并非孩子特有的担忧，比如深度伪造（deepfakes）或失业问题。
But what we actually heard when we asked kids aged 10 to 18 about AI had tons of nuance. Many of the same kids who can go on and on about music, rock climbing, or soccer met our questions with words like “bruh” and “meh”—or were so deeply against AI or uninterested in making it part of their lives that they didn’t want to talk about it at all. 但当我们真正询问10到18岁的孩子时，听到的反馈却充满了细微差别。许多在谈论音乐、攀岩或足球时滔滔不绝的孩子，面对我们的提问却只用“呃”、“无所谓”来回应——或者他们对AI极其抵触，又或者根本没兴趣将其融入生活，以至于完全不想谈论它。
One teen said his peers use it for things they know they shouldn’t, like writing papers. One told us she won’t touch AI because of the environmental impact. A few said they find the whole field disheartening: “AI isn’t the solution to our problems,” said Winter, a 17-year-old. “I’m afraid it’s going to be the end of creativity and critical thinking.” 一位青少年说，他的同龄人会用它做一些明知不该做的事，比如写论文。一位女生告诉我们，由于环境影响，她拒绝接触AI。还有几位表示，整个领域让他们感到沮丧：“AI并不是我们问题的解决方案，”17岁的Winter说，“我担心它会终结创造力和批判性思维。”
Yet most of the kids we asked admitted to using AI at least a little bit. AI doesn’t yet seem to be something a lot of elementary- or middle-school-age kids we spoke to are focused on—and they aren’t begging for it, the way they do for iPhones and Snapchat accounts. Many told us that some of their first AI encounters came from their parents or schools. Sometimes, they said, it’s just embedded in the devices and apps they already rely on. It’s just there, in things like a Google search. 然而，大多数受访孩子承认至少使用过一点AI。对于我们交谈过的许多小学生或初中生来说，AI似乎还不是他们关注的焦点——他们并不像渴望iPhone或Snapchat账号那样渴望AI。许多人告诉我们，他们第一次接触AI往往源于父母或学校。有时，他们说，它只是嵌入在他们已经依赖的设备和应用程序中。它就在那里，比如在谷歌搜索中。
What we heard tracks with the data. In a survey published in February 2026, the Pew Research Center found that 57% of teens in the US had used chatbots to search for information, 54% tapped them to help with schoolwork, and 47% had used them for fun or entertainment. Only 12% had used them for emotional support or advice. Teens are over four times more likely to be using AI in innocuous ways than potentially harmful ones. Some are even using it to build things, whether it’s a character, a tech platform, or a tutor to help other kids study. 我们听到的反馈与数据相吻合。皮尤研究中心在2026年2月发布的一项调查显示，57%的美国青少年使用过聊天机器人搜索信息，54%的人用它辅助功课，47%的人将其用于娱乐。只有12%的人用它寻求情感支持或建议。青少年将AI用于无害用途的可能性是用于潜在有害用途的四倍多。有些人甚至用它来创造事物，无论是创造一个角色、一个技术平台，还是一个帮助其他孩子学习的导师。
None of that means the worries are misplaced. Kids can stumble into unfiltered content, lean on a chatbot instead of their own judgment, or trust an answer that’s wrong—and they should be protected from those dangers. But the danger is the reason to teach the thing, not to avoid it. We don’t teach teens to never drive. We teach them to check their blind spots. 但这并不意味着担忧是多余的。孩子们可能会偶然接触到未经筛选的内容，过度依赖聊天机器人而非自己的判断，或者相信错误的答案——他们理应受到保护，免受这些危险的影响。但正是因为存在危险，我们才更需要去教授它，而不是回避它。我们不会教导青少年永远不要开车，而是教他们如何检查盲点。
What surprised us most was how much young people might be able to teach adults about AI, and how clearly the kids who use it could name what they will and won’t hand over. They’re not as worried that it will take their jobs as they are that it might harm society. And with increasing access to tools that could in theory do their thinking, their talking, or even their friend-making for them, it sounds as if most want to keep their hands on the wheel. 最让我们惊讶的是，年轻人能教给成年人多少关于AI的知识，以及那些使用AI的孩子能如此清晰地界定他们愿意和不愿意交出什么。他们并不像担心AI会抢走工作那样担心它会伤害社会。随着他们接触到越来越多理论上可以替他们思考、交谈甚至交友的工具，听起来大多数孩子还是希望自己掌握方向盘。
The Coder: Remy, 16, New York
程序员：Remy，16岁，纽约
What’s something AI did that surprised you? AI做过什么让你惊讶的事？
“A group of hackers used Instagram’s chatbot to gain access to famous accounts. The hackers convinced it to reset the passwords to accounts like Obama’s and send the reset email to their own email. Then they changed the account and posted things from several famous accounts at once, using a vulnerability that came only from AI.” “一群黑客利用Instagram的聊天机器人获取了名人账号的访问权限。黑客诱导它重置了奥巴马等人的账号密码，并将重置邮件发送到他们自己的邮箱。随后，他们更改了账号，并利用AI特有的漏洞，同时在多个名人账号上发布内容。”
The word that comes to mind when I think about AI is “indifferent.” I just don’t find the current applications that exciting for my own use. I go to school. I teach tae kwon do. I read. I play games with friends. None of that needs AI. I mean, I use it. I mostly use Claude, the free version, for programming outside of school. I had it help me write a program to see if I could tweak my computer’s overclock. So I see the appeal. But at school, I actually think AI mostly makes my assignments worse, not better. 想到AI，我脑海中浮现的词是“冷漠”。我只是觉得目前的应用程序对我个人而言没那么令人兴奋。我上学、教跆拳道、阅读、和朋友玩游戏。这些都不需要AI。我的意思是，我确实用它。我主要在校外编程时使用Claude的免费版。我曾让它帮我写一个程序，看看能否调整电脑的超频。所以我明白它的吸引力。但在学校里，我其实认为AI大多让我的作业变差了，而不是变好。
In English, everything is now in-class writing, because teachers don’t want kids cheating. So we have only 70 minutes to write a whole essay, and I think that hinders my writing. (Did you know Princeton voted to let faculty proctor exams for the first time in over a century? Their honor code goes back to 1893, and now it’s over because of AI.) 在英语课上，现在所有作业都必须在课堂内完成，因为老师不想让学生作弊。所以我们只有70分钟写完一篇完整的文章，我认为这阻碍了我的写作。（你知道吗？普林斯顿大学投票决定一个多世纪以来首次让教职员工监考。他们的荣誉准则可以追溯到1893年，现在因为AI而终结了。）
As far as code goes, I’d also rather build things myself. I’ve been making a reinforcement-learning model in a game engine with a friend; it moves randomly at first, gets rewarded for walking toward a coin, and after enough iterations it teaches itself the most efficient path. I’ve also tested AI for game development, and it isn’t there. It makes sloppy code, and it’s bad at blending mechanics into something cohesive. I’d spend more time correcting it than writing it myself. 至于代码，我宁愿自己构建。我和朋友一直在游戏引擎中制作一个强化学习模型；它起初是随机移动的，向硬币走去会获得奖励，经过足够的迭代后，它学会了最高效的路径。我也测试过AI在游戏开发中的应用，但它还不行。它生成的代码很草率，而且不擅长将机制融合得连贯。我花在纠错上的时间比我自己写还要多。
I think AI right now is sort of like the first car or the first airplane. It’s interesting but crude. It’s obviously an amazing invention but not actually good yet. It’ll get somewhere. One thing I read about was AI flagging breast cancer more accurately, trained to catch its own false positives so a human still verifies. That’s the version I care about. 我认为现在的AI有点像第一辆汽车或第一架飞机。它很有趣但很粗糙。它显然是一项了不起的发明，但还不够好。它会进步的。我读到过一件事，AI能更准确地标记乳腺癌，通过训练来捕捉自身的假阳性，从而让医生进行最终核实。那才是我关心的版本。
The Organizer: Danielle, 18, California
组织者：Danielle，18岁，加利福尼亚
What most excites or worries you about AI? AI最让你兴奋或担忧的是什么？
“I’m most worried about our ability to think critically and the potential for misinformation, disinformation, and biases to be spread through too much trust in AI.” “我最担心的是我们的批判性思维能力，以及因过度信任AI而导致错误信息、虚假信息和偏见传播的可能性。”
I’m studying engineering, and my life goal is to innovate technology that will help as many people as I can. The way I see it, AI isn’t inherently good or bad; that’s decided by the people using it. It’s already being used for lots of good. Just think about how it helps people with personalized education and more accessible medical diagnoses. 我正在学习工程学，我的人生目标是创新技术，尽可能多地帮助他人。在我看来，AI本身没有好坏之分；这取决于使用它的人。它已经在很多方面发挥了积极作用。想想它如何帮助人们实现个性化教育和更便捷的医疗诊断就知道了。
So far, the biggest project I’ve worked on with AI is called Next Voters. My teammates are… 到目前为止，我参与的最大的AI项目叫“下一代选民”（Next Voters）。我的队友们是……