THE TECHNOLOGY CHILDREN USE IS OUTPACING THE SCIENCE THAT SHOULD GUIDE IT. WE EXIST TO SOLVE THAT.
AI, algorithms, and media are reshaping childhood faster than science can keep up. We fund the research and community access programs that close the gap.
Our Mission
Our mission: to fund the research, frameworks, creative pilots, and community access that advance preventative behavioral health for children, through ethically designed media and technology.
The Mindful Media Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. We fund the work the market won't: studying how media and AI shape children's development, building ethical frameworks for the digital environments they grow up in, and making sure what works reaches the families with the fewest resources. We do this alongside Boston Children's Hospital, CHU Sainte-Justine Research Center, Evolution Health, and other leading institutions.
The Foundation operates next to Mindful Media, which builds the commercial products and infrastructure that put research into practice. The roles are distinct: the company builds, the Foundation funds the evidence that keeps the whole ecosystem honest and grounded in science.
Why Now & Why this Matters
Children spend 6+ hours a day on screens, and most of what they encounter was designed to hold their attention, not support their development. The effects show up as rising anxiety, attention struggles, and disconnection from the people raising them.
In 2026, the AAP updated its media guidance for the first time in a decade, moving pediatricians toward routine screening for digital media health at well-child visits. Across 90 to 100 million visits a year, they're now asked to screen for something they have no standardized tools to assess and no evidence-based interventions to offer.
AI is widening that gap. AI-generated content, companions, recommendation algorithms, and adaptive learning tools are reaching children faster than anyone can study their effects, and faster than regulation can respond.
We support the research, the frameworks, the creative pilots, and the community programs that close this gap before another generation of children becomes the uncontrolled experiment.
What The Foundation Funds
The Mindful Media Foundation's work is organized around three pillars: research, creative development, and community access.
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We fund research on how media, technology, and AI affect children's development, emotional regulation, and family wellbeing. Priorities: pediatric sleep and screen use, early childhood development, media-based preventative interventions, and ethical frameworks for AI in children's digital environments.
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We fund pilot projects that prove evidence-based children's media can actually be built: content and interactive experiences designed around developmental science, not engagement metrics. Our creative partners include award-winning talent from Disney, Netflix, Nickelodeon, Apple TV, and Paramount. The Foundation underwrites this early work before commercial revenue can sustain it.
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We fund programs that bring evidence-based media and technology to the families who need them most: Head Start programs, under-resourced school districts, and community health settings. Research should translate into real benefit regardless of income or geography.
Our Partners and Collaborators
Join Us: Support Research.
Expand Reach.
Your support funds the work that proves children's media and technology can be designed around how kids actually develop. We welcome contributions from foundations, donor-advised funds, institutional partners, and individuals.