Amid shaken trust in American institutions, information is our most valuable currency. From politics to law and media, Americans are on a quest to remain informed, but many are questioning what is true or what isn’t.
Truth and trust go hand in hand, and we cannot restore trust in institutions unless we can agree on the facts, if not our feelings. With the emergence of artificial intelligence, concerns about misinformation and disinformation are compounded. For example, 85 percent of Americans are concerned about AI spreading fake audio and video to the masses.
As a co-founder of the AI-driven quantitative research platform Outward Intelligence, I share these concerns. Indeed, AI can lead to unintended consequences that erode trust in the pursuit of truth — separating real from fake. However, there is much more to the AI package, which now plays an integral role in delivering informative, high-quality research to people who need to learn about the world around them.
In recent years, AI has disrupted the research industry. This isn’t happening five years from now; it is happening now. And that is a good thing. AI-driven research has the potential to increase exponentially access to information and improve it, addressing issues that have long plagued researchers, even well-intentioned ones.
Today, we can deploy coordinated AI agents with a complete understanding of survey methodology, respondent context and other crucial considerations. This allows researchers to replace traditionally expensive manual processes that are vulnerable to human error — such as 24/7 fielding operations — while expanding the pool of actionable information. Using AI, we can access data from 100 million respondents across more than 75 countries, thereby avoiding non-representative sample sizes. Beyond access, AI agents have enabled researchers to achieve the fastest turnaround times in history, allowing us to design, program, collect, and analyze research within hours, not weeks.
Think about it: If Americans wish to understand the ins and outs of public opinion about a political event 24 hours ago, that is now possible. If people want to assess the popularity of Amazon’s new app update or Apple’s latest product launch within hours, we can do so in record time — all because of AI.
Good AI actors can combat the bad ones. In an age of misinformation, disinformation and outright fraud, we need AI on our side. “Fake science” is growing at an alarming rate. AI-powered survey fraud is rampant. According to a 2025 research paper, nearly all online survey respondents have the potential to be fraudulent, and bots are exacerbating the problem.
The solution lies in AI detection, which surpasses the capabilities of the human eye. While there is a place for experts to double- and triple-check, combining human intelligence with machine learning, we need AI to be able to spot language anomalies and other outliers that may suggest fake science. From behavioral profiling to detailed text pattern analyses, good AI routinely raises red flags that were previously raised by, well, bad AI.
In market research, political polling and elsewhere, AI will produce some adverse side effects. However, human experts can leverage new-age technologies as an overwhelming force for good, increasing access to the improved research we need to remain informed about the world.
To quote Thomas Jefferson, “An informed citizenry is at the heart of a dynamic democracy.” So why wouldn’t we use every tool at our disposal to upgrade how we research and deliver data to people?
As researchers, we have an immense responsibility to operate in good faith and root out the bad actors — AI-powered or not — who would seek to spread lies. The stakes are high in an increasingly distrustful society, but the only way to overcome our shared skepticisms is to move closer to fact and truth. Because of AI disruption, we have a fighting chance.