Business Forum • 18 December, 2024 at 11:05 AM
Businesses and academia risk assuming that Gen Z students and employees are “AI natives” and must be mindful of Gen Z over-confidence in relation to artificial intelligence (AI) literacy. That is according to a new EY report developed with support from Microsoft and TeachAI, How can we upskill Gen Z as fast as we train AI?, which uses quiz-style questions to provide insight into the AI aptitude of more than 5,000 Gen Z respondents across 16 countries. The report also reveals that while Gen Z understands which products and tasks benefit from AI, their ability to critically assess the technology falls short.
In terms of AI adoption, the survey finds that the majority of Gen Z are using AI (61% are “varied” users, verses 15% “super” users and 24% “stragglers”). When it comes to aptitude, Gen Z respondents score best on questions about understanding how AI works, such as selecting which tasks and products commonly use AI (69% out of 100). But they are less confident in relation to questions that cover how to write the best prompts for AI (56% out of 100), and they score most poorly on critically assessing and identifying shortfalls, such as whether AI systems can invent facts (44% out of 100).
More reassuringly, scores show that respondents recognize the importance of hard and soft skills required for AI, ranking creativity and curiosity as the most important skills needed to use AI well (52%), followed by critical thinking (47%) and then coding / computer programming (46%). This lays the foundation for Gen Z's perception of AI's benefits and risks. Respondents view the greatest benefits of AI to be time saving on repetitive tasks, analyzing large amounts of data and reducing human error, and they view the greatest risks as increasing unemployment, reducing human learning and creativity, and generating false information.
While many Gen Z use AI as a tool to help them learn, there is a disconnect between how AI is perceived in workforce and education settings. Forty-two percent of respondents believe their educators would discourage AI use to complete certain tasks, with just 15% saying the same of their employer. This could be linked to how technology can sometimes be seen as enabling plagiarism in schools, leaving educators to balance the need to prepare students for the workforce with ensuring they're not overly reliant on new technology.
The results indicate that educators and businesses are playing catch-up to the rapidly evolving technology of AI. But they also chart a path forward to identify ways for businesses to help close that literacy gap in AI education and engagement among a Gen Z group who lean toward an optimistic view of AI but may be over-confident in their ability to evaluate the technology for optimal use.
Reflecting the wider scale of transformation that business and society face in not only harnessing the power of AI but also addressing its implications for people and the planet, the report shows that organizations need to prepare Gen Z with the right skills to understand, use and evaluate AI to innovate and evolve responsibly. The report shares key recommendation for employers and educators to achieve this, including:
- Mobilizing trustworthy information about AI on social media: The report found that 55% of Gen Z respondents ranked social media as their most prevalent source for AI information. Organizations and educators can leverage Gen Z's attention to social media for good, by creating and amplifying trusted, vetted content about AI, on the platforms this generation is already invested in and spending their time on.
- Strengthening AI education to build better literacy through public and private collaboration: The report finds that Gen Z is somewhat satisfied with the guidance and preparation for AI from their employer or educational institution, with the first choice for desired types of support being courses or training from AI providers (37%) and resources that support self-guided learning about what AI is and how it works (35%) and how to use it (34%).
Horațiu Cocheci, Director, People Advisory Services, EY Romania: ”Looking at this context through a local lens, the data from the local study conducted this year by us - EY Upskilling Survey Romania - reveals that 81% of respondents believe that state bodies and the government should actively support and fund national upskilling initiatives, while 72% of respondents consider that this responsibility primarily belongs to companies. Furthermore, 85% suggest that the government should provide subsidies or tax incentives to companies that invest in reskilling programs, thus encouraging more companies to enhance the professional development and adaptability of their employees. Considering the particular context of our country in the last month, it becomes evident that such initiatives would automatically qualify as high-impact national projects."