It Will Take a Village to Ensure an Authentic Future for Generation Beta
By: Susan-Caitlyn Seavey
Introduction
One of the many glaring issues that future generations will face is the decline in frequency of in-person human interactions. Today’s technology, especially artificial intelligence (AI) offers unparalleled tools that can be used for the betterment and progression of humanity. For example, new customer service bots, called “conversational agents” are responding to customer inquiries with efficient, personalized and human-like responses, “reshaping how we engage with [ ] companies, [and] creating a world where efficiency meets empathy–or at least an impressively convincing facsimile of it.”[1] AI software is also providing efficiency for individuals through multitasking functions, auto-generated answers to questions, and draft responses to texts and emails, saving the user valuable time. However, this technology can also create unrealistic standards and attractive environments that isolate individuals from their reality. Around the globe, AI technology is becoming more normalized and ubiquitous with software like co-pilot in the workplace and AI robots as companions, friends and romantic partners at home. The rapid development is “particularly concerning given its novelness, the speed and autonomy at which the technology can operate, and the frequent opacity even to developers of AI systems about how inputs and outputs may be used or exposed.”[2] We face the challenge of balancing the benefits of efficiency and progression of this technology with the risk of being fully consumed by it, and at the cost of our youngest members of society.
This powerful technology should be used to embrace reality and continue striving for a better world; one that actually exists off of a screen. Jennifer Marsnik summarized this challenge well by contemplating how society can “maintain authenticity, human intelligence and personal connection in a landscape increasingly dominated by algorithms, data and automation.”[3] Young minds are the most susceptible to the unrealistic standards and depictions AI can create. Considering the difficulty even adults can sometimes have when determining whether a visual is real or generated by AI, the young generations with their still-developing minds will evolve in this landscape of not always knowing what is authentic and what is not. If society fails to provide safeguards and implement protections around children and their use of our ever-progressing technology, we could end up with future generations being stuck in a perpetual a cycle of unrealistic expectations and disappointment in the real world, prompting more isolation and leading to the degradation of communities. Preserving authentic relationships and interactions with the real world will require a village: Congress must support new and developing legislation for online safety for children, companies should adopt management frameworks and clearinghouse functions to ensure transparency and accountability in consumer engagement, and parents, teachers, and community leaders must work together to encourage social-emotional learning and in-person interactions in children and teens at home, at school, and in their communities.
