Gen Z workers fear AI over-reliance is causing skill loss and diminished intelligence

Gen Z Faces Growing Concerns About AI Over-Reliance

Half of workers today admit they're overly dependent on AI tools at work, according to the 2026 Pulse of Work report from software company GoTo and research agency Workplace Intelligence 1

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. The survey of 2,500 knowledge workers and IT managers found that Gen Z workers were especially vulnerable, with 62% acknowledging their over-reliance on the technology 1

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. More troubling still, 40% of young workers say they can't work without AI, suggesting dependency has reached a critical threshold 1

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AI Making Them Dumber: Workers Report Diminished Intelligence

Nearly 39% of employees believe their AI over-reliance is actively eroding their skills and making them less intelligent, a figure that climbs to 46% among Gen Z workers 2

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. This isn't a fringe concern but rather a quiet consensus emerging across the workforce. The anxiety extends beyond perceived skill loss to fundamental cognitive abilities. A 2025 Microsoft study found that leaning too heavily on AI tools is associated with weaker critical thinking abilities 1

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. Rich Veldran, CEO of GoTo, told Fortune that this poses a particularly sticky dilemma for younger workers trying to learn the ropes early in their careers 1

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Pressure to Adopt AI in the Workplace Outpaces Training

Sixty percent of employees report feeling pressured to use AI tools to boost productivity regardless of whether tasks actually require it 2

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. This pressure exists despite significant gaps in understanding: about 69% of workers say they're not very familiar with how AI could be applied practically in their role, while 80% believe they're not using AI to its full potential 3

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. The lack of proper employee training compounds the problem. Only 44% of IT leaders say their company even has AI policies in place, and where policies exist, 80% of employees and 60% of IT leaders report workers aren't being properly trained to use AI tools responsibly 3

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AI Misuse Creates Workslop and Threatens Human Judgment

Seventy percent of employees now admit to using AI for sensitive or high-stakes tasks, up sharply from 54% just a year ago 2

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. These include legal or compliance work, decisions requiring emotional intelligence, and handling confidential information—exactly the domains where human judgment is most irreplaceable 2

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. The consequences are tangible. Around 43% of respondents admitted to using AI-generated material despite suspecting it contained errors or false information 3

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. This unchecked AI-generated content is creating what researchers call "workslop"—low-quality output that requires extensive review. About 77% of workers say AI-generated work often takes longer to review than human-produced work, with 66% reporting that reviewing workslop is creating more work for them 3

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Job Displacement Fears Add to Career Risk

Gen Z faces a difficult choice: adopt the technology and risk growing dependent on it, or resist and get left behind. Some young workers are actively sabotaging their company's AI rollout out of fear the technology will take their job, according to a study from enterprise AI firm Writer 1

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. Veldran noted this anxiety stems from the belief that workers will prove their irrelevance if AI can do the tasks they're paid to perform 1

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. These fears aren't without basis. More than 40% of CEOs plan to cut junior roles anyway, according to a recent survey from consulting firm Oliver Wyman—the same junior roles that young workers take to start their climb up the company ladder 1

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Balancing AI Adoption With Skill Development

Despite the risks, there's growing evidence that encouraging workers to integrate AI—rather than replacing them outright—may be the smarter play. A recent Gartner study found no difference in productivity returns between AI-enabled companies that have cut workers and those that haven't 1

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. Some employers report reserving raises for workers leading the charge on AI adoption. Super-users surveyed were around 3x more likely to have received both a promotion and pay raise in the past year compared to employees who have been slow to adopt these tools, according to Dan Schawbel, managing partner at Workplace Intelligence 1

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. Veldran advises using AI to take work out of the system while not ceding all human judgment to it 1

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. The opportunity is enormous—employees spend an estimated 2.6 hours every day on tasks that AI could handle, translating to more than $2.9 trillion in potential efficiency gains annually in the US alone 3

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