65% of workers have avoided using AI for moral, environmental, privacy or other reasons: CNBC survey

Neary two-thirds of workers have at some point avoided using AI because of moral, environmental, privacy, accuracy or other concerns, according to the CNBC and SurveyMonkey Quarterly AI and Jobs Survey published Tuesday.

The survey, conducted from April 17 to 21, polled 3,597 students and workers across the U.S. Of the respondents, 3,365 said they were employed and 232 said they were students.

When asked if they'd ever avoided using AI, 36% of students polled said they'd done so over environmental concerns, compared to 19% of workers. The environmental impact of AI data centers includes significant water and land use, energy consumption and heat waste.

In addition, 36% of students said they avoided using AI out of moral or ethical concerns about the technology, versus 28% of workers.

Some Gen Zers want to abstain from AI use because they worry about AI plagiarizing or stealing work made by people, says Sneha Revanur, the 21-year-old founder and president of AI policy nonprofit Encode AI, who was not involved in the survey. Others are "concerned about what it means for critical thinking and creativity," she adds, or "view it as this attack on humanness."

When it comes to practical applications, 37% of students and 26% of workers said they'd avoided AI because it isn't accurate or useful. Using AI can sometimes create more work, experts say, or lead to a kind of mental strain and fatigue researchers have called "brain fry."

Among both students and workers, 37% of each group cited privacy concerns as reasons they'd avoided using AI. Some respondents said they'd skirted AI because it was too difficult to learn (6% of students and 8% of workers), and some avoided AI for other reasons not listed (4% of students and 5% of workers).

The survey also found that two-thirds of students feel pessimistic about the job market, and 56% of students say AI makes them more pessimistic about it. Roughly 53% of workers and 65% of students believe AI is taking away job opportunities for entry-level workers.

"There's a lot of totally reasonable resistance to using AI," Revanur says. But as a current senior at Stanford University, which she calls an "AI adopter campus," Revanur says she also sees the other side of things; a large contingent of students is readily using AI in their professional and personal lives.

Many employers are encouraging workers to show they have AI skills in the hiring process. "Job postings are increasingly emphasizing AI skills and there are signals that employers are willing to pay premium salaries for them," Elena Magrini, head of global research at labor market analytics firm Lightcast, told CNBC in September. The share of entry-level positions specifically calling for AI skills has nearly doubled since a year ago, according to a recent report from early-career jobs site Handshake.

Most workers who reported using AI daily or weekly said it makes them more productive (73%) and saves them time (68%), according to the CNBC and SurveyMonkey data. More than half of all workers (55%) said they think AI will eventually be able to perform some of their job responsibilities as well as they can.

In her own life, Revanur says she uses AI daily and considers herself a "power user."

"I believe that I can use AI and get a lot of value out of it at a personal level, while also being critical of the bigger picture or also having lots of reservations at the bigger picture," she says. "I think those two views can totally coexist."

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