Parents Worry About Their Kids Using AI, but Worry More About Them Not Using It

Many parents feel pressured to help their children become familiar with AI due to its prevalence in the future workplace, although they are concerned about potential adverse effects on cognitive skills.
Research from Chicago Booth’s Alex Imas reveals that parents’ fears about their children falling behind academically drive their attitudes toward AI use, more so than worries about its negative long-term effects.
A study involving approximately 2,000 parents of children aged 13-18 in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. was conducted to measure attitudes toward AI access for their children, focusing on their willingness to pay for premium AI subscriptions.
Participants were split into control and treatment groups, with the latter also receiving information on how AI use correlated with a decline in quantitative reasoning scores among high-school students.
Results highlighted the influence of social pressure, showing that parents’ willingness to pay for AI subscriptions increased significantly as the percentage of teens in the region using AI grew, with a 60% higher willingness to pay at 80% regional AI adoption compared to 20%.