We talk to young Spaniards who reject consciously using AI

While the AI is increasingly integrated into studies, work and daily life, a parallel and still minority phenomenon is brewing in the subsoil of public opinion and professional environments: that of a current of young people who view this technology with skepticism, fatigue or rejection. Some try to limit its use; others directly reject it.

Although young generations have quickly embraced and integrated these tools into their daily lives, there are studies that point to the growth of a certain reluctance. A survey conducted in 2026 by the Walton Family Foundation, GSV Ventures and Gallup reveals how despite the fact that 51% of American Generation Z say they use AI weekly, “negative emotions towards it have intensified in the last year.” The study reflects concern about the “cost” that the continued use of this technology may have on “creativity or critical thinking.”

Diego Castilla, member of the History Student Association of the Carlos III University of Madrid, is one of them. In his opinion, “AI stupidifies the mind.” Understand that the use of this technology is driven by increasingly academic and work rhythms. harder to hold. He tries to stay out of it and assures that he only uses it in a “very specific and specific” way, because he is convinced that “it creates bad habits.” For him, in addition, there is something easily recognizable in the content generated by AI: “It is noticeable. What is made by AI lacks soul.”

Along these lines, Marcos, a 26-year-old graphic designer, believes that young people lead the “resistance” or “rejection” of AI. While he observes how the older generations feel a genuine fascination with this technology – “they love making songs, videos and images” – and accept its use without questioning it, he perceives a much more critical view among young people.

Faced with the “devotion” that he detects in some older people, Marcos observes in youth a growing need to “escape from AI.” In fact, he considers that interest in “the physical” is gaining more and more strength: “I see more young people interested in having books, attending craft workshops or dancing…”. Activities that, in his opinion, respond to the desire to get away from digital, “rest” and “connect” again.

“There are many valid reasons to reject AI”

The ecological impact, the possible loss of autonomy, the potential risk for certain professionals, the power accumulated by large technology companies behind these tools… The reasons for distancing ourselves from AI are multiple.

Marcos Escudero-Viñolo, professor at the Higher Polytechnic School of the Autonomous University of Madrid, knows several profiles that show a total rejection of AI: “Some for neo-Luddite reasons, that is, they reject AI for its social impacts; others for degrowth reasons, that is, they reject it based on its enormous ecological impacts; others practice resistance or active boycott of this technology, for example, as a criticism of heteronomy “Some combine these and other factors.”

Although these positions seem to be a minority, they are present especially among young profiles linked to groups environmentalists either degrowth —as Ecologists in Action, beyondGrowth either Your cloud dries up my river—, but, according to Escudero-Viñolo, also among students, researchers or some professionals.

For Francisco José Estupiñá Puig, a contract professor at the Faculty of Psychology of the Complutense University of Madrid and co-director of the addictive behavior research group Controlab, “there are many valid reasons to reject AI,” and these can be framed in “ethical, political or ecological positions.”

In some sectors, skepticism—which often does not reach rejection— is perceived with more intensity. “It is more common that from the artistic field they can feel threatened and even generate very strong rejection,” says César Poyatos Dorado, professor of educational technology at the UAM. This is corroborated by Marcos, a graphic designer, who finds in his professional environment a growing reluctance towards works generated entirely with AI.ç

Paula Jimenez, content creator in a 27-year-old communications agency, he feels that “AI is making us idiots.” She is concerned about the widespread use of these tools to carry out “creative and human tasks,” and believes that this concern is becoming more and more evident among young people: “In fact, I consider myself one of those young people who claim not to do things with artificial intelligence.” Along these lines, Marcos, a 19-year-old History and Politics student, observes among his group of friends “a great rejection of AI,” and although he believes that this position is not the majority among young people, he does consider it to be increasingly common.

Between rejection and critical use

“It’s the same as when a smoker admits that tobacco is bad but continues smoking. Young people use AI because it is a very practical resource but they are afraid that AI can replace people in their jobs, they criticize that what is created by AI is not as creative or interesting…” This is how María Ángeles Gutiérrez García, teacher, explains the ambivalent relationship that many of her students have with this technology; They are “capable of making many arguments against artificial intelligence despite the fact that they use it.”

Manuel Armayones, professor of Behavioral Design at the Open University of Catalonia, believes that this tension between use and rejection responds to a growing sense of discomfort. “They use AI, but at the same time they are not clear to what extent doing so is legitimate or harms them in the long term (…) We are facing a technology that not only changes how we do things, but also how we think, decide and perceive ourselves as professionals,” he explains.

According to Armayones, many young people feel that integrating AI is almost mandatory in order not to be left behind, but at the same time they fear being the ones who stop making decisions and taking on a supervisory role: “For this reason, rather than frontal rejection, many times what we see is a need to set limits and understand what role we want to have in that system.”

This limbo between rejection and critical use is perfectly reflected in the content creator Paula Jiménez, who, although she acknowledges using AI for “very automatic tasks,” admits to some alarm: “I am worried that artificial intelligence will make me an idiot.” This contradiction also runs through their environment: colleagues and friends constantly resort to these tools, but at the same time they view jobs created entirely with AI with skepticism. “I think there is a movement, especially among young people, to stop doing things with AI,” he reflects, “it may be linked to that nostalgia for recovering the past. I feel that my generation looks at things with a lot of nostalgia and tries to go back to analog.”

For his part, at 19 years old, Marcos describes the use of AI in practically any field as “dangerous.” “If you get used to a chatbot thinking, writing and reading for you, how are you going to expect to know how to think, write and read?” he asks. Despite it’s critical With this technology – “if we stop reasoning because it does not seem useful to us, we will lose our humanity” – he recognizes that there are times when he has “surrendered” to its use.

Is it possible to avoid dependency?

Raquel, a 25-year-old woman who works in the healthcare field, acknowledges that she does not use AI in her work: “I don’t need it.” However, he observes just the opposite in part of his environment. She has friends who, she says, “use AI for absolutely everything”: “To count how many days are left until a specific date, to find ATMs at their bank, to know what wine to buy…”.

That daily dependency It is precisely one of the things that bothers him the most. Still, he believes that completely escaping these tools is becoming increasingly difficult, “even if you have a critical view of them,” because AI has already been integrated into services as basic as search engines themselves.

Escudero-Viñolo maintains that, paradoxically, the system itself is pushing young people to use AI even if they have reservations about it. In the university environment, he assures, tasks begin to be designed assuming that students will use these tools, increasing their complexity and making it difficult to complete them without the support of these models. “They are forcing them to use it because they don’t arrive,” he points out. At the same time, this mass adoption is occurring “without having much idea about all the subsequent impacts it may have,” especially on the development of cognitive skills and abilities.

Although there may be widespread use of AI tools among younger generations, “it is premature to talk about addictionFrancisco José Estupiñá Puig, a contracted professor at the Faculty of Psychology at the UCM and co-director of the addictive behavior research group Controlab, prefers to talk about “dependence.” Estupiñá Puig proposes a possible future where AI “ends up becoming indispensable for many people, as the telephone or the internet connection already is.”

From educational technology, Poyatos Dorado sees it as essential “not to delegate our thinking to AI”: “If AI writes for you, it means it thinks for you.” Meanwhile, for Gutiérrez García a “critical vision of AI can be interesting, but not enough.” Especially in a context in which “people cling to its use like a burning nail.”

From psychology, Estupiñá Puig highlights the importance of “posing limits of use and seeking delimited interactions,” maintaining a “defined purpose and clear objectives.” For the expert, an uncritical use of these tools can have consequences on two levels: both in the mental health —especially when AI begins to occupy spaces of emotional or even therapeutic support—as well as intellectual support.

“That one of the three most popular uses of ChatGPT is to use it as psychotherapy, which is a terrible idea, speaks to us about a problem of regulation as well as one of access to resources to maintain mental health,” he points out. And he adds another warning: “We must be careful with the possibility that regular unstructured use weakens our critical thinking.”

In a context in which it is required to develop a relationship with a technology that in a very short time has been massively integrated into everyday life—and which, in addition, greatly facilitates many tasks—Escudero-Viñolo remembers that “stability” is a key factor to be able to reflect on its use. When the daily rhythm barely leaves room to stop, think and question the extent to which we depend on these tools, it is much more difficult to consider limits or alternative ways of relating to them.

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