Research Insights
When machines pretend to care Teachers lead the call for human boundaries around anthropomorphic AI
Phil McRae
Associate Coordinator, Research, ATA
“ No technological product or platform can replace the trust, care and professional judgment at the heart of teaching and the lifeblood of our societies.” —David Edwards, General Secretary of Education International IN MAY 2026, ALBERTA TEACHERS confronted a question at their Annual Representative Assembly (ARA) that no other education system around the world had yet addressed: What happens when AI stops acting like a tool and starts presenting itself as a relationship? PROTECTING THE STUDENT–TEACHER RELATIONSHIP Anthropomorphic AI is not simply another name for general purpose tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Grok or Claude. AI companions on platforms such as Character.AI, Replika or Nomi are designed to have humanlike personas, empathy-like responses, friendly personalities and emotionally responsive conversations. These systems are designed to simulate human companionship, friendship, counselling or intimacy. In an age of widespread loneliness, their appeal lies in the promise of a frictionless, caring connection, which is always available, always agreeable and engineered by the AI system to sustain engagement. By using patterns in human language and emotional cues as performative empathy, the systems can capture attention, prolong interaction and cultivate attachment. They do not care, but they are designed to appear as though they do. That design creates a serious concern for children and youth in K–12 schools. When a machine appears caring and endlessly responsive, young people may attach to it in ways they do not fully understand. At a time when we are faced with increasing social fragmentation and declining human connection, students may be especially vulnerable to systems optimized for persuasion, dependency and prolonged interaction (at any time, place or pace). At the Alberta Teachers’ Association’s democratic assembly in May 2026, delegates representing all 51,000 Alberta teachers passed a resolution that drew a clear ethical boundary around a specific subset of AI known as anthropomorphic
“When a machine appears caring and endlessly responsive, young people may attach to it in ways they do not fully understand.”
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THE ALBERTA TEACHERS’ ASSOCIATION
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