Public opinions and social trends, Great Britain: 27 March to 7 April 2024

The following information is for the latest survey period, 27 March to 7 April 2024, based on adults in Great Britain.

• When asked about the important issues facing the UK today, the most commonly reported issues were: the cost of living (87%), the NHS (86%) and the economy (72%); other commonly reported issues were housing (58%), climate change and the environment (57%), crime (56%), immigration (52%), education (48%) and international conflict (47%); the proportions reporting each issue were relatively similar among men and women.

• Younger adults were more likely to report the cost of living (95% among those aged 16 to 29 years, compared with 80% among those aged 70 years and over) and employment (48% among those aged 16 to 29 years, compared with 31% among those aged 50 to 69 years), as important issues facing the UK.

• Older adults were more likely to report immigration (73% among those aged 70 years and over and 66% among those aged 50 to 69 years, compared with 36% for those aged 30 to 49 years and those aged 16 to 29 years) and crime (66% among those aged 70 years and over, compared with 46% among those aged 30 to 49 years), as important issues facing the UK.

We continued to ask about people’s experiences related to increases in the cost of living.

• A quarter (25%) of adults reported they had to borrow more money or use more credit than usual compared to a year ago; this proportion was higher among adults aged 30 to 49 years (34%) compared with those aged 70 years and over (10%).

• Among adults who told us that their cost of living had increased over the last month, around 1 in 6 adults (17%) reported the price of public transport increasing as a reason for this; the proportion reporting this was highest among younger adults aged 16 to 29 years (32%).

In the latest survey period we asked some new questions on people’s use and understanding of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

• When asked about the areas of their life in which they had used AI in the past 12 months, adults reported they had used AI for their home (42%), finances (29%), the way they travel (27%), work or education (26%); around a quarter (27%) of adults reported they had not knowingly used AI.

• When asked about the actions they had taken to learn about AI in the past 12 months, around two thirds of adults (64%) reported they had not undertaken any learning about AI; smaller proportions reported they had undertaken self-learning in their own time (23%), or that they had learnt from their friends and family (18%).

• When asked about the areas of AI they would like to know more about, more than 4 in 10 adults reported: how to judge the accuracy of information generated by AI (45%), how AI is regulated (45%) or how to recognise when they were using AI (42%).

This release contains data and indicators from the Office for National Statistics' (ONS's) Opinions and Lifestyle Survey (OPN).

Breakdowns by age and sex have been provided for fortnightly estimates in the latest Public opinions and social trends, Great Britain datasets. Prior to this, breakdowns by age and sex were reported until the 17 to 29 May 2023 edition of all datasets. This was based on a routine review of the relevance and usefulness of this release. Estimates from the OPN by these and other personal characteristics are provided on a regular basis in other ONS releases. For example, OPN estimates relating to the impact of the cost of living among different sub-groups of the population are provided within the regular Impact of increased cost of living on adults across Great Britain series.

Confidence intervals are provided for all estimates in the datasets. Where changes in results from previous weeks are presented in this release, or comparisons between estimates are made, associated confidence intervals should be used to assess the statistical significance of the differences.

Sampling and weighting

In the latest period (27 March to 7 April 2024), we sampled 5,009 households. This sample was randomly selected from people who had previously completed the Labour Market Survey (LMS) or OPN. The responding sample for the latest period contained 2,484 individuals, representing a 50% response rate.

Survey weights were applied to make estimates representative of the population (based on ONS population estimates). Because of sampling changes in July 2023, some groups in our unweighted sample may be over-represented. Further information on the survey design and quality can be found in our Opinions and Lifestyle Survey Quality and Methodology Information (QMI).