May 30th, 2023, Christien Pheby
Photos of Pope Francis decked out in a Balenciaga-style puffer coat went viral on social media recently, with the 86-year old pontiff earning praise for his hitherto-unknown levels of swag. The images of the newly-appointed “Bishop of Drip” – however convincing or lifelike – were AI-created fakes generated by a 31-year-old construction worker “tripping on ‘shrooms”, but many (including writers for The Guardian and Chrissy Teigen) were fooled.
The story has raised questions about whether the rise of AI tools such as Midjourney and ChatGPT will be used to spread fake news. New YouGov data shows that it’s something that most Americans who have heard of the tools consider reasonably likely. Over half think AI image tools (e.g. Midjourney, Stable Diffusion) will be used to spread fake news, and nearly six in ten (58%) say the same of text generators such as ChatGPT.
That isn’t to say Americans don’t like AI artwork. While just 27% had seen AI artwork, 56% of those who had said they enjoyed it – while 19% said they did not. Opinion is split on whether the artwork is better or worse than that created by humans: 34% said it was, 29% said it was not, and 31% said it was roughly the same standard.
When it comes to the issue of credit, 9% of Americans think the human being who entered the prompt into an AI art generator like Midjourney deserves the credit, but 15% say the developers of the tool deserve it, and 13% say the artist that the tool is trained on should be credited. Some 21% say all three should share authorship.
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Methodology
YouGov Surveys: Serviced provide quick survey results from nationally representative or targeted audiences in multiple markets. This study was conducted online on 24-25 March 2023, with a [nationally/online] representative sample of 2,000 adults in the US (aged 18+ years), using a questionnaire designed by YouGov. Data figures have been weighted by age, race, gender and education to be representative of all adults in the US (18 years or older), and reflect the latest American Community Survey population estimates. Learn more about YouGov Surveys: Serviced.