C3AI: Where Do Trust, Design, and Evaluation Meet in Child–AI Interaction? (IDC 2026)
The second edition of the C3AI workshop at IDC2026 invites researchers, practitioners, designers, educators, and policymakers to explore how children build, lose, and renegotiate trust during interactions with AI systems. As conversational AI increasingly becomes part of children’s everyday lives, it is crucial to understand the emotional, cognitive, and social factors that shape these interactions, and to develop evaluation approaches that are transparent, ethical, and developmentally appropriate.
This workshop offers a hands-on environment where participants will collaboratively analyse authentic child–AI interaction transcripts, work with age-diverse personas, and co-design developmentally sensitive metrics for studying trust, doubt, and transparency. Organisers will provide ethically approved materials drawn from real-world studies, and, depending on available time, participant-contributed case studies may be incorporated into group analysis.
We welcome submissions on topics including, but not limited to:
Age-appropriate metrics for trust, transparency, explainability, and usability
How children’s mental models of AI develop across age groups and cultures
Strategies children use to express uncertainty, doubt, disagreement, or critique
Participatory or co-design methods involving children in AI evaluation
Child-centred guidelines for trustworthy and responsible AI
Ethical and rights-based approaches inspired by the UNCRC
Personas, transcripts, or artefacts that highlight developmental diversity
Design principles for interpretable, transparent, and cognitively accessible AI
Case studies from educational, domestic, creative, or healthcare settings
Submitting a position paper is not required for attendance. Observers are welcome and may take part in discussions and activities even without submitting materials.
If you want to contribute to the workshop discussion, please send an email to grazia.ragone@uniba.it
Participants may submit a concise position paper or artefact (eligible for inclusion in the post-workshop materials). All submissions must be non-anonymous, follow the ACM Standard Template, and be submitted in PDF format via EasyChair.
Position pieces, methodological reflections, or work-in-progress studies.
Illustrations of design challenges, prototypes, or interaction concepts.
Abstract (300–500 words)
Optional supporting visuals (images, figures, or brief videos)
Case studies may be used during the group activity depending on time.
Short contributions outlining ideas, early insights, or discussion prompts.
Up to 30 participants will be selected based on contribution quality, relevance, and diversity.
Accepted submissions will be featured on the workshop website, and at least one author of each submission must register for both the workshop and the main IDC 2026 conference.
We look forward to your contributions and to co-creating better ways to understand and support children’s interactions with AI!
SUBMIT HERE https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=c3ai0