Across the four countries surveyed, people are largely optimistic about the future of the open internet and developments in technology. They are also generally positive or neutral about the value of AI — with a greater sense in Brazil and South Africa that AI will have a positive impact while people in the U.S. and Australia see AI having a neutral impact. 

This outlook, combined with the publics’ openness to journalists using various forms of technology, presents an opportunity to producers of journalism: To make use of the technologies that are available in ways that serve public needs (as the public articulates them) which include easy access and preferred formats, while communicating about technology uses in ways that address public concerns. This can, in turn, increase journalists’ own capabilities in reporting, safety and ultimate sustainability.

Why we did this study

This report is part of CNTI’s broader 2024 “Defining News Initiative” which examines journalists, policy and technology, in addition to public perceptions. The survey data in this report measures the public’s perceptions of news and technology in Australia, Brazil, South Africa and the United States.

How we did this

In partnership with Langer Research Associates, CNTI collected data from probability samples in Australia (N = 1000), Brazil (N = 1000), South Africa (N = 1,012) and the United States (N = 1,025). All samples were weighted using demographic variables (age, sex, education and macroregion).

More details are available in “About this study” and full questions and results are available in the topline.

Across countries there is optimism about the internet as well as developments in technology

Majorities in each country are at least somewhat confident the internet will be a place to get and share news openly in the future. People are most confident about the internet’s role in news dissemination in South Africa where about 60% of people are very confident and another 20% are somewhat confident about the future of the internet as a place to access and share news. In the other three countries, majorities are still confident, but more cautiously so. In Australia (39%) and the U.S. (44%), pluralities are somewhat confident, while in Brazil, roughly equal numbers of people are very (31%) or somewhat confident (33%). 

People are also generally positive about how developments in digital technology will impact their ability to keep informed in the future. Strong majorities of Brazilians (75%) and South Africans (74%) have positive perceptions of the potential impacts of digital technology. Overall, people in Australia are the most divided about digital technology’s impact on staying informed in the future. The majority (58%) are still positive — but a third of people (32%) think the impact will be negative, the highest in any country. Just 9% are neutral on the impact of technology. 

The U.S. also stands out with the fewest positive responses (46%). But the number of negative responses in the U.S. is similar to those in Brazil and South Africa; instead, people in the U.S. are roughly equal parts positive and neutral.

Generally speaking, strong majorities of people in the surveyed countries think AI will either have a positive impact on their ability to keep informed or will have no effect one way or another. 

However, we see strong regional differences in levels of optimism. Close to half of people in Brazil (46%) and South Africa (49%) are optimistic, and about one-in-four are neutral — 27% of responses from Brazil and 22% of responses from South Africa. The reverse is true in Australia and the U.S. where small minorities, 16% and 15% respectively, are positive about AI’s impact on their ability to stay informed. Pluralities in both countries are neutral in their perspective — 42% in Australia and 46% in the U.S. Approximately a third of Australians (35%) and Americans (36%) have a negative perspective on the potential impact of AI technologies, about two to three times as many as in Brazil or South Africa.

The pattern of responses is very similar within each country when asked about the impact of AI on journalists’ ability to report.

This general positivity about technology is shared by journalists, according to CNTI’s survey of journalists. While journalists are generally positive about the role of technology in the information ecosystem, their attitudes about AI are also more mixed. And the same regional patterns hold: journalists in the Global South, which includes Brazil and South Africa, are more positive about AI than journalists in the Global North, which includes Australia and the United States.

The countries where people are more optimistic about AI also express less personal use of generative AI

Yet, the public’s greater positivity towards AI in Brazil and South Africa exists alongside relatively low familiarity: few people have tried to use generative AI (18-27%) in the last year, and sizable minorities (26-27%) do not even know what it is. More Americans (32%) and Australians (41%) have tried to use generative AI in the last year, although at least as many people (57% in the U.S., 43% in Australia) have not. Relatively few people in these two countries do not know what generative AI is.

In general, the countries that have more favorable opinions about AI have also heard less about it, but Brazil bucks that trend. Almost three-quarters of Australians (73%) and Americans (71%) have heard at least a fair amount about recent developments in AI, compared with 39% of South Africans. On the other hand, 62% of Brazilians reported hearing at least a fair amount about this topic and more Brazilians than anyone else reported hearing a great deal about it.

This widespread optimism about technology and the future — coupled with strong agreement across countries that reporter-based news organizations are a critical part of an informed society — suggests a broadly shared understanding of the current information ecosystem. There is opportunity to make use of the technologies that are available in ways that respond to the public needs. This can, in turn, strengthen journalists’ own capabilities in reporting, while building trust and continuing to demonstrate their value to an informed public.

Continue reading:

• Overview
• Journalism organizations are valued, but not as the sole arbiters of reliable news reporting
• In working to keep informed, knowing who to trust is the greatest challenge asked about
• Technology is important to the public, and they are ok with most journalistic uses — except for American and Australian views on image editing and AI
• About this study
• Country profiles

Read CNTI’s companion report based on surveys with journalists around the world.

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