Third of university students in Great Britain think AI job losses will cause social unrest, poll finds

Key points

• One in three university students think AI will wipe out jobs so rapidly it will trigger civil unrest, according to a survey by King’s College London (KCL).
• Students are among the heaviest users of AI, the poll found, with 77% using it at least a few times a month – compared with 46% of workers – and 27% using it daily or almost daily.
• They are also among the most pessimistic about AI’s economic impact.
• More than half said they were convinced job losses would be worse than in a normal recession.
• The findings are the first from a major new tracker of attitudes to AI by the King’s Institute for Artificial Intelligence and the KCL Policy Institute.