In the New York Times, Michelle Goldberg writes that college students are jeering at tech oligarchs who give commencement speeches about the benefits of AI. A Wall Street Journal article begins, “The only thing growing faster than the artificial-intelligence industry may be Americans’ negative feelings about it—as former Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt saw on Friday” when he was booed at University of Arizona.

I had been wondering about this topic. The students I know best tend to be highly critical of AI, but presumably their generation holds varied opinions.

The Quinnipiac Poll asked Americans their attitudes about AI, and here I show those broken down by age.

Older people are the most likely to say that they are not excited at all by AI. Millennials (now at least 30 years old) are the most likely to say they are very excited, although that it is true for only 12% of them. Among Gen Z (under 30), the most common response is “not so excited,” and only 4 percent of them are very excited.

When asked whether AI will do more good or harm to people’s own day-to-day life, most Americans say “more harm,” and that is true of 55% of Gen-Z. The youngest generation is the most likely to say that AI will harm education (68% think it will harm education and 29% that it will help).

Just over 40% of each generation is somewhat concerned about AI overall, with no age differences. A bit more than half of Gen Z are very concerned, but rates of concern are higher among Millennials, who are quite polarized on the topic.

Without access to the raw data, I can’t see how age, education, gender, ideology, race, and personal experience with AI relate to opinions about AI. However, respondents who have more education and income are generally more favorable to AI in this poll. Those patterns hint that current college students may be more sanguine about AI than their contemporaries who are not going to college.