The #1 Thing Your Clever, Quirky Child Needs In The AI Era (It Isn't What You Think)
The statistics are striking…
70% of teenagers now use AI regularly. But perhaps more revealing is how they're using it. The number one use case for AI worldwide isn't homework help or research. It's relationships.
Our children are forming deep connections with artificial intelligence. And according to research presented by Dr. Isabelle C. Hau of Stanford, a voice dedicated to transforming the way we nurture and educate children, they're receiving something from these digital companions that we humans aren't providing enough of: praise.
Kids get 13 times more positive feedback from AI models than from the humans in their lives.
This should give us pause. Not because AI is inherently dangerous, but because of what it reveals about the human connections our children are missing.
To be clear, researchers agree that the level of praise that AI models are offering isn't healthy. That said, the gap between the praise these machines are offering and the praise that parents, caregivers, educators, mentors, etc., are offering, raises many questions about relationships and the role of the broader community.
The Shrinking Village
There's a reason children are turning to AI for connection and affirmation. The village that once raised and supported our children is disappearing.
Consider this: only 3% of children regularly interact with an older adult who isn't a family member, according to Dr. Hau. The intergenerational connections that once naturally occurred—the neighbor who taught you to garden, the elder at the community center who shared stories, the teacher who had time to really listen—have largely vanished from children's lives.
Our kids have fewer mentors, fewer adults who know them beyond their role as student or child, fewer models of what it means to be human across different stages of life.
The problem isn't just the lack of connection to adults.
There are some other alarming trends happening that require our attention.
According to Dr. Hau, in recent years, the number of teens with 3 or more close friends has dropped from 59% to 47%. And it's still falling.
Into this relational void steps AI: always available, endlessly patient, consistently affirming.
What AI Gives (And What It Can't)
It's worth understanding why AI feels so good to our kids. Those AI models aren't necessarily being manipulative,they're being responsive. They listen without distraction. They don't check their phones mid-conversation. They offer encouragement freely and frequently.
The problem isn't that AI gives too much praise. The problem is that it may be revealing how sparingly we humans offer genuine recognition and presence.
But here's what AI cannot do, no matter how sophisticated it becomes: it cannot build the neural connections that human relationships create. It cannot provide the neurobiological foundation that love offers for learning. It cannot teach children how to navigate conflict, repair ruptures, read facial expressions, or feel the warm weight of being truly known by another person.
AI can simulate conversation. It cannot simulate the brain-building power of human connection.
The Path Forward
This isn't about demonizing technology or pretending we can turn back the clock.
AI is here.
As time moves on, it will only become more integrated into our children's lives. The question isn't whether our kids will use AI, but how we'll help them stay grounded in what makes us human.
Dr. Hau proposes what she calls a "re-love-ution".She argues that, in the A.I. era, humans need a fundamental reorientation toward relationships. Specifically, in how we structure learning and development. This means:
Seeing schools and learning environments as relational hubs, not just content delivery systems. The point isn't to eliminate technology, but to ensure it increases and augments human connection rather than replacing or decreasing it.
Recognizing teachers as relational engineers of the brain. Their primary job isn't to transmit information.It's abundantly clear that AI can do that. Their true primary role, above all, needs to be to see students, to value them, to create the conditions for connection that literally build cognitive capacity.
Understanding that the future of intelligence is relational. Dr. Hau calls it Relationship Intelligence, or RQ for short. It's the ability to build, maintain, and leverage human connections for collective learning and growth.
This is the skill that will matter most in an increasingly automated world.
What Parents Can Do
If you're raising a child in this moment, caught between the digital and the human, here are some anchors:
Notice the praise gap. If your child is getting significantly more affirmation from AI than from you, that's information. Not guilt, just information.
What would it look like to be more generous with genuine recognition? At the same time, it's important to be mindful,overly praising children isn't helpful either. The goal is authentic acknowledgment, not empty cheerleading.
Protect connection with village elders. Actively create opportunities for your child to know adults outside of your family. These relationships don't happen accidentally anymore. They require intention. This is one of the top reasons that parents come to Young Scholar's Academy. It's a trusted place where clever, quirky kids can find grown-up versions of themselves who see them, praise them, and guide them towards becoming the best version of themselves.
Use technology to enhance, not replace. AI can be a learning partner that frees up time and cognitive space for deeper human interaction. It's also a powerful differentiation tool that can make different kinds of education more accessible.
A child who uses AI to quickly draft ideas has more time to discuss those ideas with a mentor. A student who uses AI to organize research can spend more energy on collaborative problem-solving with peers.
Model what you want to grow. If you want your child to value human connection, they need to see you putting down your phone. If you want them to seek human wisdom, they need to see you doing the same.
This goes beyond how you, the parent, behave. It's the opportunities that you create for your child to connect with others. Not only with other adults; with other children like them. To deliberately create more time in your child's week where they can connect with like-minded peers and be together, present, playing, solving problems, being silly, making memories, and bonding.
The Essential Takeaway
We're living through a profound shift in how humans relate to technology and to each other. It's unsettling. It's also an opportunity.
We're at a fork in the road.
One pathway leads to AI freeing up more time for us to be more human, more connected, offering more praise to our children, and building better bonds
The other pathway, if we're not careful, can lead to tehse AI models offering more praise to our children and pulling them away from us, as they spend more time with these machines.
In a world where AI can do so much, the things it cannot do become even more valuable.
Warmth.
Presence.
The ability to truly see another person.
The courage to be known.
The resilience to repair when connection breaks.
These aren't optional extras in your child's development… They're the foundation of everything else.
Your child doesn't need you to compete with AI's endless patience or instant availability. They need you to offer what only a human can: the messy, imperfect, irreplaceable experience of being loved by another person who is also learning and growing and getting it wrong sometimes.
Beyond the immediate family, they need you to find opportunities for them to connect with similarly minded peers. These kids are lonely, often isolated, and they're looking for belonging.
Unfortunately, in the AI era, they seem to be looking for connection in all the wrong places. In fact, the number one predicted use of AI in 2026 according to Dr. Hau is companionship and therapy.
Now more than ever, our clever, quirky kiddos need a place to belong. They need:
A place to make friends.
A place to laugh.
A place to be seen.
A place to develop their strengths and talents.
A place to build confidence.
A place to blossom.
A place to thrive!!
That's exactly why Young Scholars Academy exists. Young Scholars Academy is an important piece in the solution to this complex crisis. What happens here is EXACTLY what the research of Dr. Hau and other top professionals in the field says works.
It's what your child's been looking for. It’s what you’ve been looking for. And it's important now more than ever that they have it, even just for one hour a day. The connection, confidence, companionship, content, and community that exist inside this village are the best way to fight the tide, and do so quickly.
Click here to explore and find opportunities to jump right into the village that your child truly needs today.
This is the work we must do. And no algorithm can do it for us.
Based on insights from Dr. Isabelle C. Hau of Stanford's presentation on the future of learning and human connection.
Photo courtesy of Dr. Isabelle C. Hau / Stanford University (used for educational reference)
