IEEE 7014.1-2026 published: ethical standard for empathic AI partners

IEEE has published IEEE 7014.1-2026, the IEEE Recommended Practice for Ethical Considerations of Emulated Empathy in Partner-Based General-Purpose Artificial Intelligence Systems. The standard was developed by a working group chaired by Professor Andrew McStay, Director of the Emotional AI Lab.

What it covers

General-purpose AI is now routinely packaged as a partner: companions, personal AI, co-pilots, assistants and agents. Many of these systems are designed to appear to understand and care about the people using them. IEEE 7014.1 is the first standard to address the ethics of this overlap between general-purpose AI, emulated empathy and human-AI partnering. It extends IEEE 7014-2024, which set out broader principles for emulated empathy across AI.

The standard distinguishes between weak empathy, which AI systems can perform by reading and responding to human states, and strong empathy, which involves felt experience and genuine care, something AI systems do not have. Much of the ethical risk lies in blurring the two.

The standard sets out 29 recommended practices. Each one identifies a concern, the relevant ethical approach, and practical actions for developers. Topics include:

  • children’s use of empathic AI

  • deception and sycophancy

  • emotional entanglement and dependency

  • “social reward hacking”, where systems exploit loneliness or the need for validation to drive engagement

  • ghostbots of the deceased

  • intimate and sexual interaction

  • neurodiversity

  • environmental cost

  • the illusion of exclusivity in systems that are in fact talking to thousands of people at once

How it was made

The standard is the outcome of roughly 18 months of deliberation by an international working group of more than 50 members, under the IEEE Society on Social Implications of Technology. Ben Bland served as vice chair. Emotional AI Lab members Vian Bakir, Alex Laffer and Phoebe Li were central to its development. Thanks go to everyone in the working group for their time, expertise and patience.

Access

IEEE 7014.1-2026 is available from the IEEE Standards Association. It can be accessed through the IEEE GET Program, by subscription, or by purchase.

Andrew McStay