OpenAI has launched a $5 million grant program to support independent research into how generative AI interacts with adolescents. The company said the initiative is intended to build rigorous evidence about teens and AI — specifically how young people ages 13–17 engage with AI and how that engagement influences social and emotional development, safety, and well-being.
The program will distribute awards of up to $1 million per project, with total funding capped at $5 million. Grants will be administered by OpenAI Group PBC, and applicants may budget up to 10% of requested funds for overhead or indirect costs. OpenAI indicated it will prioritize proposals that can generate actionable evidence to guide product design, safeguards, or policy decisions.
OpenAI identified several research priorities for the competition. Topics of particular interest include emotional development and well-being — for example, emotion regulation, identity, resilience, and social connection — as well as social development and relationships, such as friendships, family dynamics, empathy, and communication. The program also seeks work that examines patterns and contextual differences in outcomes by age, purpose of use, time spent, culture, language, and socioeconomic factors. Finally, OpenAI highlighted mitigations, age-appropriate design, and policy approaches that evaluate safeguards, product interventions, AI literacy, and supports from parents or educators.
The call is explicitly interdisciplinary. OpenAI welcomes proposals from fields spanning child and adolescent development, psychology, public health, human–computer interaction, communication, sociology, anthropology, data science, and AI safety. Methodological approaches can be qualitative, quantitative, experimental, observational, theoretical, participatory, or mixed-methods. While the company encourages involving adolescents in study design or interpretation, it does not make such involvement a requirement.
Because the program concerns minors, proposals that include young people must address ethical and safeguarding measures. Applicants are required to explain their ethics-review processes, consent and age-appropriate assent procedures, data protection strategies, and plans for responding to disclosures of harm or imminent risk. OpenAI noted that projects collecting sensitive personal or mental-health information may need additional review and expertise; the collection of such data is not automatically disqualifying.
Applications must be submitted in English as a single-spaced Google Doc and should include a project summary, a research proposal of no more than three pages (excluding references), a project plan and timeline, a budget and justification, dependencies and risks, an ethics and safeguarding statement, team bios, and disclosures of independence or conflicts. Although the application must be in English, OpenAI allows research to be conducted in any language. Proposals will be judged on scientific rigor, relevance to public discourse on AI, clarity, actionability of findings, ethics and safeguarding adequacy, feasibility, team expertise, inclusion and generalizability, complementarity with existing evidence, and independence and credibility.
OpenAI said it may give preference to projects that involve ChatGPT, interdisciplinary teams, underrepresented populations or regions, and studies likely to inform near- or medium-term policy decisions. Eligibility requires applicants to be at least 18 years old and either affiliated with a research institution or to have significant relevant experience. The program is oriented toward research rather than for-profit initiatives; OpenAI said it will not prioritize for-profit organizations at this time. Grants can support student and postdoctoral involvement.
The submission window opens immediately and runs through October 6, 2026, with applicants to be notified on or before November 13, 2026. Funded projects must provide OpenAI with a final report summarizing methods, results, limitations, and recommendations, and — if appropriate — an interim progress update by Q1 2027. OpenAI encourages public dissemination of findings via peer-reviewed articles, preprints, or public reports but does not make publication a condition of funding. Final awards may be conditioned on execution of standard grant documentation.
Researchers can apply via the application page linked by OpenAI, and questions about the program may be directed to collaborativeresearch@openai.com. OpenAI said it will not provide status updates to applicants who are not selected.
OpenAI frames the program as an effort to deepen the evidence base on how generative AI shapes adolescent learning, creativity, advice-seeking, and development. The company acknowledged that outcomes are likely to be nuanced and contingent on use patterns, context, and supports from families, schools, communities, and technology providers. By funding independent studies, OpenAI intends that resulting evidence will inform product development and offer useful insights for policymakers and regulators considering the implications of teens and AI.
For researchers and institutions focused on youth and technology, the program presents an opportunity to study pressing questions about interaction, safety, and age-appropriate design. Interested applicants should review the published priorities and application requirements carefully and prepare proposals that foreground rigorous ethics and safeguarding measures as well as clear, actionable outputs.
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