This is part of Wedge Issues, a pop-up advice column about politics, running now through the election. Submit a question here—it’s anonymous!
Dear Wedge Issues,
My grandparents are in their early 80s, and beginning to show some cognitive decline. They had a large hand in raising me, but now my sister handles the bulk of the caretaking duties because I’m moving across the country soon. Over the last couple visits I’ve become increasingly concerned over the amount of A.I. content they are consuming, my grandma on Facebook, and my grandpa on YouTube. My sister said not to fight them on anything they’re “learning” unless they are at risk of getting scammed out of money, because it just confuses them to explain it. I taught my grandma, who handles the finances, the warning signs of scams and disconnected her credit card from her phone (again).
But what I saw on my latest visit really troubled me. Every 10 minutes my grandma was showing me another A.I.-generated picture of a politician. My grandfather was watching an amalgamation of A.I. images, video game footage, stock footage, and stuff ripped from movies that claimed to be “secret reporting” on various wars. I say “various wars” because at one point whatever he was watching claimed we were secretly at war with Iran, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia. He did at one point ask me if it was A.I., and I told him yes, and explained why, but he watched it for another two hours before switching it to something less political. Also, my grandpa was very upset that he can’t tell what’s real anymore. My grandma got mad when I tried to explain that an image of J.D. Vance (who she dislikes, and the image made her dislike him more) was A.I.-generated.
My sister said to not worry about it if it’s propaganda that just reaffirms what she already believes, but I really do. She is of the “ignore it and redirect” philosophy. I can’t rope in my mom here, she just got back on OK terms with my grandma, and I can’t ruin her relationship with her mother.
My grandparents are fairly progressive for Midwesterners who have never left their small rural town. But I can see they are confused, distressed, and easily tricked by A.I. content. It’s increasingly hard to hold a conversation without telling them something they saw just isn’t real.
How do I protect my grandparents from political A.I. disinformation without 1) making them feel like I’m calling them dumb, 2) distressing them about tech they don’t understand, and 3) arguing about beliefs I know are rooted in disinformation that they don’t think is disinformation because “they saw it on the news?” (YouTube. They saw it on YouTube.) And: How can I convince my sister that this is a problem and to back me up here?
—A.I. Headache
Dear Headache,
I really feel for you and your grandparents! The sudden proliferation of A.I.-generated nonsense on the internet is extremely bewildering, not to mention worrisome for the future of our society. The only (minuscule) upside is that this is not just a problem for people your grandparents’ age. None of us are equipped for this. So, the confusion is something of an equalizer between young and old.
That’s something that could, weirdly, help you here. Because you can honestly tell your grandparents that you’re in this together. It’s a fact that will be key to talking about A.I. in a non-patronizing way, and it may be the most human way through this whole mess (for all of us).
But first, let’s address the basic question of whether your grandparents’ media consumption is a problem.
It’s great that this situation doesn’t seem to be tearing your family apart, or otherwise causing major relationship damage or social isolation issues. Not every family is so lucky. It also doesn’t sound as if your grandparents are getting radicalized into any wild, fringe beliefs, either. Of course, I can’t say that for sure—I don’t know exactly what your grandfather is consuming. But I reached out to some misinformation experts to find out what that whole “secret war” narrative you mentioned is about, and most experts I talked to assumed it was probably some kind of A.I. sludge where the target is simply engagement—that is, making money off your grandfather’s attention—rather than spurring any kind of action or indoctrination. Take heart in knowing it’s probably not Russian disinformation.
But if the sludge is “just” demanding your grandparent’s attention, that is still itself concerning. I’m particularly worried about your description of your grandfather’s behavior, and the way it seems to be taking up a lot of his time and thoughts. If he starts to exist more and more in this bizarro universe, it could make him feel more isolated from the real world around him. And it could sap him of energy. We think of screentime as a big issue for kids, but Carolyn Aldwin, the director of the gerontology program at Oregon State University, said in an email that the pixelation of images on YouTube and the like requires brains to fill in gaps for missing information, and that can be particularly fatiguing for older adults with cognitive impairment. At a more basic mental health level, it can’t be good for them to be steeped in alarmist content all the time. So, I do agree with you that you should try to ease them out of this.
The first and broadest piece of advice I have is to try to make sure your grandparents have active offline lives. Often, people are drawn to online conspiracy theories in part because it gives them a sense of empowerment, that they have secret and important knowledge. And if your grandmother is interacting with these bad A.I. photos of politicians, she may find “power” in digital activism or community in her allies in comment sections. Culturally, Americans aren’t great at making retired people feel useful and valuable. So, addressing any potential isolation and purposelessness might help get at the root cause here. That could mean helping them look into volunteering activities around them, or encouraging them to join groups with a robust social calendar.
Another simple suggestion is to just distract your grandfather when he brings it up. Your sister is right—redirection isn’t a bad tactic in some of these cases. (That’s especially true if your grandparent is dealing with rapid cognitive decline.) An amiable “Wow, that’s so interesting. Anyway, how is the new bird feeder working out?” could work well. Don’t think of it as ignoring the issue, think of it as taking the issue seriously by trying to herd them back into the real world a bit.
And redirecting sometimes, or most of the time, doesn’t mean you have to take talking about artificial intelligence off the table entirely. I spoke with Jeff Hancock, the founding director of the Stanford Social Media Lab, and his student Ryan Moore, who studies the role that age plays in internet and technology use, about your case. They said that you should not start by challenging your grandparents’ beliefs, but by listening to them carefully and patiently. Approach your conversations, as I’m sure you do, with empathy: Their behavior is likely driven by a desire to understand the world and look out for their family and their community.
The next step is to provide them with tools to figure out what’s real. You have the power to become a collaborator in their quest for answers. You could, for example, do a joint activity, looking at explainers—on Facebook and YouTube, meeting them on their favorite platforms—on how to spot A.I. disinformation. When they show you something strange, you could gently say, “Oh interesting, should we look together to see where this comes from?” Together, you can do a search, look at your favorite fact-checking sites, or for research on the source. They may not know some of the basics you take for granted—like opening a new tab and searching for verification of specific details. Hancock and Moore also recommended a conspiracy-theory-debunking chatbot you could check out with them. Remember to emphasize confusion you have over the A.I. images and videos—you might be more savvy than they are, but you can probably agree that it’s wild that a computer can generate real-ish looking faces. Tell them you can hardly believe the things you’re learning about A.I., too. That way they will see you as an ally rather than a lecturer.
If they seem open to more help, you could even encourage them to sign up for programs on digital literacy for seniors. Research shows that even short training courses on tools for fact-checking can significantly help seniors with identifying false information, and your family members may feel less embarrassed working through it alone or with an outside third party. Some places have in-person classes you could look for. There are also many online resources tailored toward older people. Poynter, for example, has an online digital literacy course for seniors.
Should you grow impatient, try to bear a few things in mind. Some of the strengths older people have—namely, their experience—work against them in this specific regard. They have spent decades consuming media, but it is based on the belief (true, up until now) that humans are behind editorial decisions. So even if you tell them that a computer is choosing videos for them, they may have a hard time understanding it as anything other than the product of human curation. It’s a lot to un-learn.
And there are some biological factors that may be working against them. Aldwin pointed out that visual problems that can come with aging may make it harder for someone to recognize the discernable imperfections—the weird extra fingers, the strange lighting—in A.I.-generated images that cue the rest of us in to the unreality of what we’re seeing. Aldwin noted that older adults with cognitive impairment may have a harder time maintaining focus, which could also make it harder for them to recognize the other telltale signs of A.I.-generated language—the overuse of formal language or strange sentence structures, for example. Making matters worse, they may more easily lose track of where they heard certain pieces of information, making it harder to distinguish what’s confirmed and what’s a mere theory. So you can see why this might become frustrating for them.
If talking about it goes nowhere and all else fails, you can nudge your grandfather’s YouTube algorithm in a more positive direction through simple quality time. Show him fun videos you think he might like. Laugh at dumb prank videos together. Pull up cool and legitimate science, history, and news shows—it seems he wants to know more about the world, and you may introduce him to his new favorite content creators. And while you can’t interfere with your grandmother’s Facebook feed, you can send her cat videos over its messaging platform.
Of course, a lot of this would be better done in person, and if you’re across the country, it’s not fair to put it all on your sister, who’s already shouldering most of the caregiving responsibilities. Tell your sister to be on the lookout for truly alarming content: My biggest fear would be health-related misinformation, which could put your grandparents in danger. But if she doesn’t see an obvious toll on your grandparents, stick with what you can do yourself. Look up local programs on digital literacy. Send them the tools Hancock and Moore pointed out. Talk to them often on the phone, and listen with empathy. Let them know that if they ever want help wading through this, you’re there to tackle it with them. A.I. is making the internet a more bewildering place for everyone, not just them.
