Frequent AI chatbot users more likely to believe anti-vaccine myths, poll finds | Technology

Adults in the U.S. who frequently receive health advice from AI chatbots are more likely to believe myths about vaccines, according to a survey released Tuesday by health research firm KFF.

The survey, conducted in May and surveying a representative sample of 2,480 U.S. adults, found that the use of AI tools and chatbots was associated with belief in falsehoods, such as vaccines that cause autism or that the measles vaccine poses more danger than the related virus. The association held when controlling for factors such as age, race, education and political partisanship.

Concern about how AI could spread misinformation and influence public opinion has long been an issue among researchers and health officials. Repeated surveys show that a large percentage of Americans are starting to turn to AI chatbots for medical advice. another KFF survey We found that as of March, nearly a third of US adults had received health advice from AI.

AI firms have also acknowledged the prevalence of questions about medical topics. “Health is already one of the most common ways people use ChatGPT, with hundreds of millions of people asking health and wellness-related questions every week,” OpenAI said in a blog post in January announcing the creation of a dedicated ChatGPT Health tool.

KFF’s survey found that 35 percent of U.S. adults who use AI tools to access health information at least once a week believe it is “definitely or probably true” that measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccines have been proven to cause autism in children. Only 20% of US adults who do not use AI for health have a similar belief, while 29% of US adults who occasionally use AI for health believe this myth, according to the survey.

The lie that MMR vaccines cause autism is the mainstay of the anti-vaccine movement, which gained further influence after the Covid-19 pandemic and the appointment of Robert F Kennedy Jr as US health secretary. Kennedy and others associated with the anti-vaccine movement have used medical studies that have long been debunked or retracted to advance their views. The myth that MMR vaccines cause autism gained prominence when the Lancet magazine published a study in the 1990s. later withdrew completely After his findings turned out to be fake. Yes since you were rejected by many other studies.

The KFF survey also found that 29% of U.S. adults who frequently use AI tools for health believe mRNA vaccines can change your DNA, but that’s not true, whereas only 20% of people who have never used AI held this belief. 22% of frequent AI users believe the measles vaccine is more dangerous than the measles virus; Only 15% of those who do not use artificial intelligence for health.

Turning to social media platforms for health advice is also linked to belief in vaccine misinformation in survey results. KFF found that “adults who use social media for health information at least once a week are more than twice as likely as those who do not use social media for health to say that the myth linking MMR vaccines to autism is ‘probably’ or ‘definitely true’ (37% vs. 16%).”

The survey also found that there is a divide between who demographic groups sometimes look to social media for health advice and who consults AI. Lower-income groups and people without a college education are more likely to seek advice via social media, while a higher percentage of people in households earning over $90,000 per year or with a college education are turning to AI tools.

The KFF survey did not ask which AI models participants use when getting health advice. Different chatbots generate different levels of misinformation, and each contains its own biases as a result of training data and decisions by the respective companies about how bots should respond to divisive questions.

Using chatbots to find health information continues a long-standing pattern in the way people use search engines: About 5% of all Google searches are health-related, and about 77% of people use search engines to find information about new diagnoses. 2025 research paper By a researcher from Georgetown University.