Recent books and studies have begun to highlight the risks that AI poses to children. This is a good thing. Maybe we’re collectively realizing that we shouldn’t wait a decade after a new technology emerges — as we did with social media — before sounding the alarm.
But kids aren’t the only ones affected by artificial intelligence. Mothers are, too.
The vast majority of parents — 81% — use AI for parenting support. I’m one of them. But as much as I appreciate AI managing my grocery list, I worry it could make parenting harder. When I asked Google’s Gemini how AI might go about dismantling American motherhood, its answer rang eerily true: It warned that AI could encourage “hyperindividualized isolation,” intensify perfectionism and make every parenting decision seem to carry a risk of “permanent, catastrophic consequences.”
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