pew Research Center, a nonpartisan think tank that tracks public opinion, published a report today about how workers feel about AI.
Technology has become an increasingly common element in the workplace in recent years. And its role is likely to grow as AI becomes more capable, thanks to advances like the large language models, such as GPT-4that gave us ChatGPT and a growing number of other tools.
While there is no shortage of reporting on people’s attitudes toward AI, the Pew data is sizable and relatively recent, coming from 11,004 American adults surveyed between December 12 and 18 of last year, at like ChatGPT mania was picking up steam after its release in late November.
The report suggests that most workers expect AI to transform hiring, firing, and evaluation. Many people report that they feel unsure about what those changes might look like and are concerned about the potential impacts of AI.
Some 68 percent of those surveyed said they expect AI to have a big impact on workers over the next 20 years. Interestingly though, only 28 percent said they thought AI would affect them personally, while 38 percent were unsure what the outcome might be for their own work.
Those answers reflect the fact that no one really knows how AI will change jobs and how it works in the coming years. Technology is rapidly evolving and its impact often differs greatly across industries and even roles.
However, we can expect existing uses of the technology to expand and become more sophisticated. Some employers are already using AI to help screen job applicants, while enterprising job seekers seek to outwit algorithms with clever tricks. In theory, AI technology has the potential to make hiring fairer and increase diversity in the workplace. But in practice it has sometimes done the opposite, leading the US government to warn employers about the potential of algorithms to discriminate against people with disabilities.
The Pew survey reflects this mixed picture, with 47 percent of people saying they think AI would do a better job of hiring than a human, but 41 percent opposing the use of AI in hiring.
Surveillance in the workplace is an area of general concern, with 81 percent of respondents saying that increased use of AI will make workers feel inappropriately watched.
Courtesy of the Pew Research Center