Few Americans trust the companies developing AI systems to do so responsibly

Washington DC, July 27, 2023—New Ipsos polling finds that an overwhelming majority of Americans do not trust the groups and companies developing artificial intelligence (AI) systems to do so responsibly. In the same vein, Americans also show little trust in the federal government to regulate AI. The poll also finds that when it comes to potential issues around artificial intelligence, a slim majority believes that the government or companies and brands should be held responsible for solving them, while few say the same of consumers.

Detailed findings:

1. Few Americans have faith in the companies and groups developing AI systems and the ability of the federal government to regulate AI.

• Eighty-three percent do not trust the companies developing AI systems to do so responsibly, compared to just 15% who do trust them. Majorities of Republicans (86%), Democrats (81%), and independents (83%) agree.
• Along these lines, 72% of Americans do not trust the federal government to regulate AI. Partisan differences exist here, as a strong majority of both Republicans (88%) and independents (72%) display a lack of trust in the government, compared to a slim majority of Democrats (53%).
• Additionally, nearly two in three Americans (63%) believe that companies profiting from AI should be responsible for funding job creation and training programs for people whose jobs could be lost due to AI.
• While a majority across all political aisles share this sentiment, Democrats (74%) are more likely than Republicans and independents (59% each) to agree. Those with a high school diploma or less (68%) are also more likely to agree than those with a college degree (58%).

2. Americans hold companies and the government responsible for solutions to potential problems involving AI more than individual people or consumers.

• A plurality believes companies and brands are most responsible for creating or retaining local jobs (42%) and ensuring that AI software provides accurate search results and factual content (38%). Fewer hold the government (14% each) and individual people or consumers (15% and 11%, respectively) responsible, and around a third are unsure.
• Americans are split between the government and companies when it comes to who is most responsible for preventing the spread of misinformation created by AI (28% for government, 26% for companies and brands) and ensuring that AI doesn’t discriminate or bias (26% for government, 28% for brands). Similar to other issues, few hold consumers responsible (14% and 12%, respectively).
• One area where Americans believe the government is responsible is in protecting individual creators from unfair use of their work. Thirty-one percent believe the government should be most responsible, compared to 24% who say companies and brands and just 16% who say consumers.

3. One in five Americans have used an AI chat program in the last six months.

• Twenty-one percent report using an AI chat program in the last six months. Fewer have used an AI-assisted internet search program (16%) or an AI image generation system (12%).
• Across all of these AI-related technologies, Americans aged 18-34 and 35-49 are more likely than Americans over 50 to have used them.
• For personal use, nearly half of Americans (47%) use AI for research and learning. One in three use it to give instructions in a humanlike way with a voice assistant (35%), and slightly fewer use AI to create content (29%) or automate schedules/tasks (27%).
• Similarly, research and learning (43%) is the most common work- or business-related task that AI is used for. Americans also report using AI in their work to review content (26%), generate ideas (24%), automate scheduling (23%), create content (21%), and transcribe or summarize meetings (19%).

About the Study

This Ipsos poll was conducted by Ipsos from June 16 to June 18, 2023, using the probability-based KnowledgePanel®. This poll is based on a nationally representative probability sample of 1,023 adults age 18 or older. The sample includes 256 Republicans, 349 Democrats, and 300 independents.

The survey was conducted using KnowledgePanel, the largest and most well-established online probability-based panel that is representative of the adult U.S. population. Our recruitment process employs a scientifically developed addressed-based sampling methodology using the latest Delivery Sequence File of the USPS – a database with full coverage of all delivery points in the U.S. Households invited to join the panel are randomly selected from all available households in the U.S. Persons in the sampled households are invited to join and participate in the panel. Those selected who do not already have internet access are provided a tablet and internet connection at no cost to the panel member. Those who join the panel and who are selected to participate in a survey are sent a unique password-protected log-in used to complete surveys online. As a result of our recruitment and sampling methodologies, samples from KnowledgePanel cover all households regardless of their phone or internet status and findings can be reported with a margin of sampling error and projected to the general population.

The study was conducted in English. The data were weighted to adjust for gender by age, race/ethnicity, education, Census region, metropolitan status, and household income. The demographic benchmarks came from the 2022 March Supplement of the Current Population Survey (CPS). Party ID benchmarks are from recent ABC News/Washington Post telephone polls. The weighting categories were as follows:

• Gender (Male, Female) by Age (18–29, 30–44, 45–59 and 60+)
• Race/Hispanic Ethnicity (White Non-Hispanic, Black Non-Hispanic, Other, Non-Hispanic, Hispanic, 2+ Races, Non-Hispanic)
• Education (Less than High School, High School, Some College, Bachelor or higher)
• Census Region (Northeast, Midwest, South, West)
• Metropolitan status (Metro, non-Metro)
• Household Income (Under $25,000, $25,000-$49,999, $50,000-$74,999, $75,000-$99,999, $100,000-$149,999, $150,000+)
• Party ID (Democrat, Republican, Independent, Something else)

The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3.4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level, for results based on the entire sample of adults. The margin of sampling error takes into account the design effect, which was 1.23. For Republicans, the margin of sampling error is 6.5 and the design effect is 1.14. For Democrats, the margin of sampling error is 5.6 and the design effect is 1.16. For independents, the margin of sampling error is 6.0 and the design effect is 1.13. The margin of sampling error is higher and varies for results based on sub-samples. Sampling error is only one potential source of error. There may be other unmeasured non-sampling error in this or any poll. In our reporting of the findings, percentage points are rounded off to the nearest whole number. As a result, percentages in a given table column may total slightly higher or lower than 100%. In questions that permit multiple responses, columns may total substantially more than 100%, depending on the number of different responses offered by each respondent.

For more information on this news release, please contact:

Mallory Newall
Vice President, US
Public Affairs
+1 202 374-2613
[email protected]

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