Growing up with interactions that provide immediate responses and comply with every request can shape children's habits, expectations, and patterns of communication
Children are innately curious, and throughout any given day they come up with all manner of questions: Why don’t fish have hair? Why do flowers wilt so quickly? Their need to understand the world — and develop their language skills and ideas — makes them tireless conversationalists.
While their inquiries would usually be directed at parents or teachers, in modern homes even the youngest kids might now talk to a digital interface like Siri or Alexa. These AI systems are fast becoming part of many children’s everyday lives, as kids ask them to play music, help with their homework, answer questions, or just chat to them.
These kinds of interactions are no longer strange, but we need to ask what happens when they become completely routine. Do they change the way children learn to communicate? Do they change the words they use? And are they a threat to kids’ cognitive abilities?
Language learning
