Gen Z Australians are leveraging the power of generative AI in a variety of time-saving ways, but hold significant concerns for career prospects in an increasingly automated world.

A new study launched by Melbourne-based research body The Insight Centre has found many young Australians, aged 14 to 27, reserve a heightened degree of apprehension toward the impact of artificial intelligence on their future opportunities. 

The new report – From Gen Z to GenAI: The impact, opportunities and challenges of Generative AI for young Australians – reveals how adolescents and young adults are beginning to soften in their previous devotion to artificial intelligence. 

Of the 560 participants surveyed in The Insight Centre study, 74 percent use AI to assist with their schoolwork, and nearly half of those participants leveraged AI to process their ideas and streamline their thinking. 

However, as The Insight Centre associate director Dr Anna Denejkina asserts, “There is a clear tension between the opportunities Gen Zs see in AI and the significant concerns they hold about its impact on their future.”

While she underlines that “young people are using AI to help with study, develop new skills, and even for emotional support and advice,” she also raises concerns around employment potential. “Gen Z remains deeply concerned about how GenAI could affect their job prospects, the creative industry and their online safety,” Denejkina says.

Nearly a third of Gen Z Australians seek to future-proof careers against AI 

While 43 percent of respondents stated they have not reconsidered their study or career pathways due to the threat of being replaced by generative AI, nearly one third of participants revealed that they have. 

30 percent of young Australians expressed genuine concerns that their desired educational or vocational pursuits would no longer be valid pathways in the future. Some are considering a pivot into the technology sector, or away from professions that can be automated with the use of AI. 

A notable area of concern is job displacement within arts and media, where many fear the theft of creative work and the ripple effects these can have on the industry as a whole and those who operate within it. While many regard the threat as widespread across the entire creative sector, these fears are tipped more toward men than women. 

More than a third of men (38 percent) are likely to reconsider their study or career pathways, compared to just 23 percent of women.

Generative AI presents differing concerns across young men and young women

Another key finding of the new report is the differing attitudes toward AI between young men and young women. A notable gender gap has begun to consolidate itself in recent years, with 41 percent of young men revealing they felt skilled in utilising generative AI as compared with just 20 percent of young women who said they felt the same way. 

Moreover, 50 percent of males are likely to feel confident or very confident in using AI tools, in contrast to only 24 percent of young women who said they feel the same. The concerns raised within the report suggest this gender gap could only serve to exacerbate current inequalities between men and women. 

Denejkina called for the requisite steps to be taken “to ensure women are equipped with the skills and confidence to engage with these tools”. She also highlighted the specific concerns expressed by women toward deepfakes, specifically those on the cusp of adulthood, aged 18-21. 

“These fears were not unfounded, with research confirming that the vast majority of deepfakes were non-consensual sexual content that almost uniquely targeted women,” Denejkina says. “This is a growing reality, not a hypothetical threat.”