Men are outpacing women in generative AI usage both professionally and personally, creating a growing gender divide. The Wall Street Journal spotlighted a recent working paper that revealed women are almost 20% less likely to utilize AI tools than men, partly due to concerns about professional repercussions and peer judgment. The trend was consistent across individuals with diverse backgrounds and was especially evident in AI smartphone usage. Experts warn that unless addressed, these biases could reinforce, or even exacerbate, existing gender imbalances.
Women are 20% less likely than men to use generative AI.
🚀 As Director of Innovation at an all-girls’ school, the gender gap is one of the reasons I am making AI training for students and staff a priority.
Lisa Ward recently reported in the Wall Street Journal on an academic research paper, published this year, examining AI and the gender gap.
As she highlights, the paper shows just how stark the gap is:
• Women make up only 42% of ChatGPT users
• On mobile, just 27% of ChatGPT downloads come from women
• Across 18 global studies (143,000 people), women were 20% less likely than men to use generative AI
• Some women even fear that using AI could undermine their professional credibility.
Ward ends by paraphrasing the views of one of the authors of the study, Rembrand Koning, Associate Professor at Harvard Business School:
‘it is critical that both genders use generative AI, so that the artificial intelligence learns from everybody and develops in a way that is gender neutral. If men are the primary users, generative AI could exacerbate gender biases or stereotypes, he says.’
💡AI will shape the future. Who shapes AI matters even more.
🙋♂️🤦♀️ AI Inequality: Men are all in on leveraging AI. Women are holding back. Why? Not from lack of interest, but from fear of being penalized for using it.
That’s the stark finding from the new study, Global Evidence on Gender Gaps and Generative AI (Otis, Delecourt, Cranney, Koning,) and echoed in The Wall Street Journal across regions, industries, and income levels, women are consistently less likely to use generative AI tools.
This gap isn’t trivial.
If women hesitate to adopt, their needs risk being underrepresented in training data, and innovation evolves without them.
The Economic Times also reported that data from the United Nations International Labor Organization shows that women are 3X more likely to lose their jobs due to AI-driven automation.
It threatens to become a self-reinforcing cycle that widens inequality.
The real question isn’t who uses AI more. It’s:
⭐️ How do we create environments where women feel safe and rewarded for leveraging AI?
⭐️ How do we ensure trust and recognition, not penalty, for adopting the tools that define the future of work?
Because this isn’t just about productivity. It’s about who gets to shape the next era of technology and power. Thanks to Dr Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic for his excellent post highlighting the gap that needs to be addressed.
Curious, have you seen this fear of ‘penalty’ in your workplace? Do you feel confident leveraging AI?
The competence penalty imposed on women in the workplace from biases - unconscious or conscious - will continue to prevent the gender gap from ever closing.
The frustrating discoveries and trends from this study really bother me. Despite achieving higher performance ratings, women are still not believed to have as much potential as men, and when evaluated on identical output and tool usage, men were rated higher.
Why doesn't society lift women up rather than continue suppressing their spirit and potential?