Can AI Stand In for Human Survey-Takers? Not Really
Synthetic surveys using digital twins do a poor job estimating the public mood and are especially error-prone for some subgroups, including Republicans and Black adults.
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Samuel Bestvater is the Associate Director of Data Labs at Pew Research Center.
Sam helps lead the Center’s data science research, using computational tools and techniques to study the behaviors and life experiences of the public. He’s involved in every step of the research process, from guiding which questions to ask, to deciding how to approach studying them, to writing up reports on the findings and discussing them with the media. He also helps set standards for careful, replicable analysis and for using AI responsibly and thoughtfully in the Center’s work.
Sam’s research has covered a wide range of topics on technology, society, and politics. Right now he’s particularly interested in understanding how the rise of AI is impacting the way people get information, as well as studying how people communicate online and use different platforms in an increasingly fragmented information ecosystem.
Sam joined the Center in 2021 as a computational social scientist. He holds a dual-title Ph.D. in political science and social data analytics from Pennsylvania State University, where his work developed methods for measuring political expression in text using AI language models. Sam’s academic research has been published in journals such as Political Analysis and the Journal of Peace Research.
