Key insights
- According to a brand new survey from the Gallup and Lumina Foundation, one in six students (16%) say they’ve already modified their major resulting from the perceived impact of AI on the job market.
- Most went into the social sciences (26%), followed by business (17%) and technology (13%).
- Almost half of scholars (42%) have thought of changing their major resulting from AI.
Nearly half of faculty students are considering changing majors due to AI – and one in six students have already made the switch.
A latest survey A study of three,800 college students by Gallup and the Lumina Foundation found that about 16% of scholars said they modified their major because they consider AI is reducing the variety of entry-level jobs available on the market. Nearly half of faculty students, about 42%, have thought hard about changing their major for a similar reason.
“This is one of the clearest signals we’ve seen that students are rethinking their future in response to AI,” said Dr. Courtney Brown, vice chairman of impact and planning on the Lumina Foundation Business Insider.
Of the 16% of scholars who modified majors, the survey found, most went into social sciences (26%), followed by business (17%) and engineering (13%).
“Students are moving in both directions in technology fields,” Brown said. “Some move into the technology industry because they see an opportunity in AI, while others move away because they are afraid of disruption.”
The survey found that students in technical and vocational programs are probably the most open to changing their major – about 70% say they’ve seriously considered it. On the opposite hand, students within the humanities, healthcare and sciences were the least prone to change their major resulting from AI, in keeping with the survey. Students in these disciplines also used AI the least.
“I don’t think students realize that AI is going to replace this,” Brown said.
The impact of AI on young professionals
A 2024 Harvard University study The study of 62 million staff at 285,000 U.S. firms found that entry-level positions at firms integrating AI have been “shrinking” since 2023. The researchers wrote that AI is “undermining the ‘bottom rungs’ of career ladders” because it may possibly automate the “intellectually mundane tasks” typically left to junior professionals.
A separate one Stanford University evaluation from October this trend increased. The survey found that hiring of entry-level staff in AI-at-risk jobs equivalent to software development, customer support and paperwork fell by 13%. The results showed that AI is beginning to have a “significant and disproportionate impact on early career professionals.”
Industry leaders have sounded the alarm about AI’s potential to exchange entry-level staff in a wide range of industries. Dario Amodei, CEO of AI giant Anthropic, said last 12 months that AI could eliminate half of all entry-level office jobs by 2030 and push unemployment to twenty%. Meanwhile, Victor Lazarte, general partner at enterprise capital firm Benchmark, said last 12 months that AI is “completely replacing humans” and that lawyers and recruiters specifically needs to be wary of technology interfering with their work.
Another report notes increased interest in AI
In technical fields, students seem like turning away from majors that AI could easily take over, one said March report from Nichea platform for researching and evaluating K-12 schools and colleges within the United States. Instead, students show more interest in areas of AI development, equivalent to software engineering and AI-focused disciplines, fairly than old-fashioned programming.
Allison Shrivastava, an economist at Niche and writer of the report, told Business Insider that that is a superb sign that students considering software development are beginning to move into AI-related fields – it shows that they’re adapting to the evolution of the tech world.
“This is a good answer in terms of what we will need from the workforce in the future,” Shrivastava told the outlet.
Key insights
- According to a brand new survey from the Gallup and Lumina Foundation, one in six students (16%) say they’ve already modified their major resulting from the perceived impact of AI on the job market.
- Most went into the social sciences (26%), followed by business (17%) and technology (13%).
- Almost half of scholars (42%) have thought of changing their major resulting from AI.
Nearly half of faculty students are considering changing majors due to AI – and one in six students have already made the switch.
A latest survey A study of three,800 college students by Gallup and the Lumina Foundation found that about 16% of scholars said they modified their major because they consider AI is reducing the variety of entry-level jobs available on the market. Nearly half of faculty students, about 42%, have thought hard about changing their major for a similar reason.
“This is one of the clearest signals we’ve seen that students are rethinking their future in response to AI,” said Dr. Courtney Brown, vice chairman of impact and planning on the Lumina Foundation Business Insider.
