Americans say they are increasingly using artificial intelligence in their everyday lives. But they also say they don’t necessarily like it.
A new poll by Quinnipiac University reports that “an increasing number of Americans see more harm than good when it comes to AI’s impact on their daily lives and education and they are divided about its impact on health care.”
They also say trust in AI remains low and the way it has impacted their lives is happening faster than they expected but that “there is more concern than excitement about AI.”
The poll asked how people felt about AI in regard to use in the workforce, politics, the military and AI data centers. They were also asked how they are using AI and respondents said:
- 51 percent said researching topics they are curious about.
- 28 percent said writing something.
- 27 percent said on school or work projects.
- 27 percent said analyzing data.
- 24 percent said creating images.
- 20 percent said for medical advice
- 15 percent said for personal advice.
- 5 percent said for companionship.
A little more than a quarter of respondents, 27 percent, said they have never used AI tools, which is down from 33 percent in April 2025.
More than three-quarters—76 percent—said they don’t think they can trust information generated by AI “hardly ever” while 49 percent said only some of the time.
“The contradiction between use and trust of AI is striking,” said Chetan Jaiswal, associate professor of computer science and associate chair at the Department of Computing at Quinnipiac University School of Computing and Engineering.
The poll found that 80 percent of respondents are either very concerned (38 percent) or somewhat concerned (42 percent) about AI, while 18 percent are either not so concerned (10 percent) or not concerned at all (8 percent).
When asked about how AI will impact employment, 70 percent of Americans think advancements in AI are likely to lead to a decrease in the number of job opportunities for people, 7 percent think they are likely to lead to an increase, and 18 percent think advancements in AI will not make much of a difference. The younger the respondent the more they thought it would impact employment negatively.
“Younger Americans report the highest familiarity with AI tools, but they are also the least optimistic about the labor market. AI fluency and optimism here are moving in opposite directions,” said Tamilla Triantoro, associate professor of business analytics and information systems at Quinnipiac’s School of Business.
“Americans are more worried about what AI may do to the labor market than about what it may do to their own jobs. People seem more willing to predict a tougher market than to picture themselves on the losing end of that disruption—a pattern worth watching as the technology moves deeper into the workplace.”
