Meta and Stanford University have reportedly recently joined forces in what it calls a "community forum on generative AI," claiming that the majority of its 1,500 participants from Brazil, Germany, Spain, and the United States viewed AI positively, with the number increasing even more after talking to experts.
The disclosure was made as part of a study that Stanford University and Meta published on a forum where people discussed policy ideas for AI chatbots and heard information about AI from "experts, academics, and other stakeholders."
(Photo: KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV/AFP via Getty Images) A photo of the META logo during the US social network Instagram opening on a tablet screen in Moscow on November 11, 2021.
The October 2023 Meta Community Forum, hosted by Stanford's Deliberative Democracy Lab, yielded results that indicated a slight minority of 393 American participants, 49.8%, believed AI had "a positive impact."
After the forum, 54.4% of participants believed AI had a positive impact, 4.6% more than before the forum started.
Participants from Brazil, Germany, and Spain were also present during the forum. Most participants from other countries had extremely positive attitudes regarding artificial intelligence before the forum, and these sentiments only grew during the event.
Compared to participating Americans, a slightly higher percentage of participants from other nations had previously used ChatGPT or comparable chatbots.
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Meta's AI Initiatives
Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp's parent company, Meta, previously introduced generative AI products like Imagine, which can generate visuals based on language inputs.
Additionally, it has overrun its services with Meta AI chatbots that are incorporated into a number of its applications. Some have famous faces, such as Charli D'Amelio, a TikTok influencer.
Other key findings of the community forum included most participants thinking that AI chatbots should be able to learn from previous exchanges to provide more insightful responses, as long as users are aware. The discussions led to an agreement with this suggestion.
Following the discussion, the majority of participants also believed that, given sufficient information, AI chatbots could mimic human behavior.
AI-Fueled Workplace Anxiety
Although the Meta forum appears to be promoting AI positively, a study conducted in the UK with close to 5000 workers found that while computers, laptops, and other more traditional technologies seem to be improving people's health, AI, robots, trackers, and other new technology are detrimental to people's well-being.
The online survey was completed by 4,802 workers in the United Kingdom who are actively employed for pay and at least eighteen years old between May 22 and June 30, 2023.
Using five operationalized dimensions-mobility, self-care, typical activities, pain/discomfort, and anxiety/depression-the researchers were able to gauge the individuals' well-being.
The consequences on the well-being of the four types of technologies that are becoming more prevalent in the industry were investigated. Software technology utilizing machine learning and AI was the focus of the analysis.
The researchers found that three of these technology categories- robots, wearable trackers, and software based on artificial intelligence and machine learning- correlate negatively with workers' health and welfare.
However, utilizing more conventional ICTs (information and communication technologies) at work has been demonstrated to enhance well-being.
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