Introduction
Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a tool that the modern generation
specifically the generation z and generation alpha have become accustomed to. Some
use it as their core search engine when they’re tackling their assignments for school
and some use it for recreational purposes. We see them using it, but what exactly is
generative ai? According to the Oxford Library, “Generative ai is artificial intelligence
designed to produce output, especially text or images, normally requiring human
intelligence, typically by applying machine learning techniques to large collections of
data.” In this paper the impact of the increased use of generative ai among adolescents
will be discussed. More specifically the impact on their: cognitive development, their
social development and their emotional development. But who are the adolescents that
we’re referring to? Adolescents are individuals who are in the age range of 13-19 years
old. These are individuals who are currently in high school and experiencing growth in a
lot of aspects of their lives. After the impact of the use of ai is discussed, the ethical
practices that the students should follow will be discussed as well as the strategy, that I,
a teacher in training will use to ensure that they understand why it’s important to use ai
carefully and responsibly.
The Use of Generative AI’s impact on Adolescents
How generative ai impacts an adolescent’s cognitive development
Cognitive development according to Malik and Marwaha (2023) is described as the “lifelong
process of growth in mental capacities, including thinking, reasoning, memory language and
problem solving.” This is basically the growth of one’s intellectual abilities.
Nagata et al. (2026) suggested that some positive attributes of ai on an adolescent’s cognitive
development are: improvement in personalised learning techniques and potentially, growing
their conversational skills and other language strengthening skills.
However, the dependency of generative ai inhibits the growth of these skills if the skills aren’t
being given an opportunity to develop. Adolescents sometimes don’t even attempt to do their
assignments on their own just because they know they’ll be able to copy and paste it into the
most popular chat room; ‘Chat gpt”.
The continuous use of these ai engines makes the student become dependent on it and the
use of independent critical thinking, problem solving skills are not being put to use, the fact that
they themselves aren’t the ones doing the work and they won’t take the time to process what
they just copied and pasted or inserted into the ai chat makes them unable to replicate the
information when its time for them to relay the content they would’ve learnt in the exam rooms,
they often face difficulties.
How it affects their social development
Social development was defined by beyouedu (2025) as “the lifelong process through which
individuals learn to interact with others, understand social cues and rules and learning how to
manage one’s emotions.’’ When students use ai they equip themselves with a safe space for
socialisation such as chat rooms like “Character AI’’ where they can talk about their interests
and feelings or even practicing building their communication or language skills. They can also
use it as a tool for” the growth of emotional regulation, helping them to process their emotions in
a safe, controlled way.’’ (The American Psychological Association, 2025)
Following these advantages, there are disadvantages as well, the first notable one noticed is their
disability to use their basic human skills such as empathy, conflict resolution, and how to
navigate complex peer disagreements due to them being overly reliant on ai and now they’ve
developed a mechanistic way of dealing with other people’s emotions. This is supported by
research done by (Fang et al., 2025). They also develop a strong dependence for the ai
characters, some even creating an intimate boyfriend-girlfriend relationship. This highlights the
withdrawal they’ll have from real world relationships and will cause an increased feeling of
loneliness and a spike in significant dependence on technology. Generative ai also can be used in
a very irresponsible way, where students create deepfakes-which are videos, sounds, and images
that are generated with ai to or manipulate information with peoples faces and voices which can
lead to the victim facing a damaged reputation. This is also a violation of the victims, privacy
and is a form of peer bullying