Ask your doctor or pharmacist. Or perhaps ChatGPT?
The debate on AI swings between euphoria and disillusionment. We wanted to know what people in Switzerland are actually doing. The answer: many have long since made up their minds.
Within twelve months, The Economist has completely shifted its tone on artificial intelligence: from the ‘economics of superintelligence’ to the ‘AI backlash that is only just beginning’. The debate centres on companies, investment and productivity. We asked a simpler question: what do working people in Switzerland do when they face a problem in their daily lives?
To find out, we surveyed 651 working people in German-speaking and French-speaking Switzerland. Not in abstract terms, but based on two specific situations: a severe sore throat with a fever, and a lamp that needs fitting.
Three findings particularly caught our attention.
Among young people, the shift has already taken place. 48 per cent of 15- to 24-year-olds turn first to an AI chatbot, whilst 41 per cent use a search engine. Among 55- to 65-year-olds, it’s the other way round: 63 per cent use a search engine, 17 per cent use AI. Overall, 71 per cent of working people use AI chatbots every week.
Convenience trumps trust. When it comes to health enquiries, the websites of pharmacies, hospitals and doctors are the most trusted sources: 92 per cent consider them trustworthy. However, only 19 per cent turn to them first or second. For AI chatbots, the figure is 60 per cent.
Even those who use Google read AI summaries. 65 per cent always or mostly read the AI summary on Google. Among those under 25, nobody says they never read it. As a result, clicks on a company’s own website are becoming less frequent. In future, visibility will mean: do I appear in the summary, and is my content accurately reproduced?
What this means depends on the sector. For healthcare providers and insurers, it is no longer enough simply to have the best information. It must reach users where they first look for it. In marketing, the chatbot is the entry point for the under-25s, whilst for the over-40s it is the search engine with its AI summary. And for employers: seven out of ten employees use AI every week anyway. The question is no longer ‘if’, but ‘how’.
In the study report, you’ll find all the results broken down by age, language region and gender, along with the methodology, tables and our analysis. This includes why trust in AI is hardly influenced by the topic at hand, and why the very youngest are the ones who tend to ignore Google’s AI mode.