Mental health

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Who we become when we talk to machines

Brian, a middle-aged financial consultant, spends his day sitting in front of three screens. Two of them involve his job. The third features a chatbot, which he has given a woman’s name and frequently uses. Brian spent years on the road for work earlier in his career, has never married, and recently broke up with […]

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We all know a lack of exercise is bad for our bodies. So what is relying on AI doing to our brains? | Devi Sridhar

I suspect nearly all of my students use AI, and I worry about its corrosive effects. We must not entrust tech companies with our long-term healthProf Devi Sridhar is chair of global public health at the University of EdinburghWhen I was a postgraduate student at the University of Oxford in the early 2000s, I interviewed

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Estimating suicide risk from text

When people reach out during a mental health crisis, a top priority for counselors is identifying those with a high risk of suicide. The distressed person’s language holds critical clues, and a new tool developed by scientists at MIT’s McGovern Institute for Brain Research is designed to pick up on and rapidly evaluate those signals.The

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Poitras Center to fuel early careers of 50 young scientists dedicated to psychiatric disorders research

Patricia and James Poitras ’63, longtime MIT supporters, have launched a fellowship program for graduate students and postdocs studying major mental illness, expanding their MIT philanthropy to directly support early-career scientists. The commitment establishes 50 two-year fellowships through the Poitras Center for Psychiatric Disorders Research at MIT’s McGovern Institute for Brain Research. Five fellowships will be awarded every

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Chatbots can exploit our most basic human drive for attachment. Here’s how to have healthier relationship with AI | Gaynor Parkin and Dave Winsborough

This intimacy economy is tapping into the deepest parts of our intimate psychological infrastructureThe modern mind is a column where experts discuss mental health issues they are seeing in their workMichael* is an engineer whose company embraced the AI wave. He enjoys testing ideas with chatbots. However, recently his manager became worried about his judgement

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Ila Kumar: Innovating with communities

Before Ila Kumar thinks about how to build technology, she asks a different question: What is the context that technology will operate in, and who needs to be involved in the design? For Kumar, meaningful innovation doesn’t result from engineers or designers working in isolation. Instead, she believes the best innovations emerge when the people who

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UK expects Meta to match US child safety measures after $18bn settlement

Minister calls for Instagram owner to extend sweeping new safeguards for young users to BritainUK politics live – latest updatesBusiness live – latest updatesThe UK government expects the Instagram owner Meta to roll out the same protections for children in Britain as those it agreed in the US on Wednesday, as part of a court

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Zuckerberg lied about concern for child safety, Meta whistleblower testifies at landmark trial

Arturo Béjar, former Meta safety engineer, tells jury tech company was aware of products’ potential harm to childrenMeta has taken a “don’t ask, don’t tell” strategy when it comes to the safety of children on its social media platforms, according to a whistleblower who testified during a landmark trial against the company on Tuesday and

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Reel-ing it in: Meta is paying influencers to promote teen accounts

Tech Transparency Project’s report shows whenever governments mull platform regulations, company recruits influencers to promote its safety featuresIn July 2025, Meta gathered parenting influencers from all over Australia at a waterfront venue overlooking the Sydney Opera House. It was a camping-themed event and in many ways was like any other influencer affair. There were Instagram-branded

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US states take on Meta in pivotal trial over child social media addiction claims

State attorneys general allege that tech company intentionally designed addictive products that harm young peopleMore than half of the states in the US have joined together in an unprecedented lawsuit against Meta that goes to trial on Tuesday, accusing the parent company of Instagram and Facebook of deliberately designing addictive products that lured in young

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