About the Lab
The Childhood and AI Lab is a global research and action center – and a project of AIChildSafety.org – working to ensure AI strengthens, rather than weakens, childhood attention, curiosity, creativity, critical thinking, and social skills.
Why Now ?
Our Model
In an era when artificial intelligence is rapidly reshaping every aspect of human life, children stand at a unique crossroads. From smart toys and educational platforms to conversational AI companions, today’s children are the first generation growing up fully immersed in AI. This technological immersion is already transforming how children think, learn, create, and relate – yet society is proceeding without adequate evidence, standards, or safeguards.
AIChildSafety.org was founded to address this critical gap by conducting research into the effects of AI on children and youth and helping NGOs, tech companies, governments, and families navigate AI risks to ensure every child can learn, thrive, and participate safely in an AI-powered world. One of the ways we do this is through our Childhood and AI Research Fellowship, which gathers a wide spectrum of researchers committed to understanding and addressing the effects of AI on children.
Our Research Fellowship
The Lab launched in 2026 with the Research Fellowship – a cross-disciplinary community advancing evidence on AI’s effects on childhood and translating insights into practice.
What’s Next
Core Activities
Original Research
We will run coordinated studies from lab to classroom to home to understand effects on attention, memory, executive function, creativity, and social development; findings will inform builders, regulators, and schools.
Safety Engineering
We will probe AI systems for developmental risks and publish our evaluations and proposed mitigations to accelerate safer product choices.
Standards & Risk
We will collaborate with other entities to develop an AI Safety Standard aligned to children’s development that defines developmental risk classes, evidence thresholds, and age‑appropriate assistance levels.
Co‑Design & Literacy
We will co‑create safer product patterns with youth, parents, and teachers and deliver practical AI‑literacy programs and use policies for families and schools.
Measuring Impact
Our approach is to measure what matters: attention stability, executive function, critical thinking, creative expression, social‑emotional health – and the product patterns and safety decisions that influence them. Results will be published in an open Evidence Commons for the public good.
Governance & Safeguarding
Partner with the Lab
We collaborate with NGOs, schools, governments, and technology companies to translate evidence into safer, more effective AI models and tools for children.