Figure 1. Athena Nike Temple on the Acropolis, February 2026.

Workshop & Non-Archival Paper

"Mixture of Amazement at the Potential of This Technology and Concern About Possible Pitfalls": Public Sentiment towards AI in 15 Countries

Patrick Gage Kelley, Yongwei Yang, Courtney Heldreth, Christopher Moessner, Aaron Sedley, Allison Woodruff

IEEE Data Engineering Bulletin, 44(4):28–46, 2021

December 2021

Part ofAI Explainability →

Abstract

Public opinion plays an important role in the development of technology, influencing product adoption, commercial development, research funding, career choices, and regulation. In this paper we present results of an in-depth survey of public opinion of artificial intelligence (AI) conducted with over 17,000 respondents spanning fifteen countries and six continents. Our analysis of open-ended responses regarding sentiment towards AI revealed four key themes (exciting, useful, worrying, and futuristic) which appear to varying degrees in different countries. These sentiments, and their relative prevalence, may inform how the public influences the development of AI.

Cite this paper
@inproceedings{kelley2021mixture,
  title     = {"Mixture of Amazement at the Potential of This Technology and Concern About Possible Pitfalls": Public Sentiment towards AI in 15 Countries},
  author    = {Kelley, Patrick Gage and Yang, Yongwei and Heldreth, Courtney and Moessner, Christopher and Sedley, Aaron and Woodruff, Allison},
  year      = {2021},
  booktitle = {IEEE Data Engineering Bulletin, 44(4):28–46, 2021},
  url       = {https://pgk.io/papers/2021-mixture-of-amazement-at-the-potential-of-this-technology-and/},
}
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