YouTube tops TV and film as a story medium in UCLA survey

Young audiences put YouTube above TV and film as a place a story can be told, and they are more open to stories about AI than the online argument about them suggests. That is the news in the 2026 Teens and Screens report from the Center for Scholars & Storytellers at UCLA, published this week.

In the report, 72.9% of respondents named YouTube among the media that can tell a story, more than TV at 70.3% and movies at 70.2%. 79% said short-form content, which the report lists as Reels, YouTube and TikTok, can tell a story too. The report is an annual nationwide survey, and UCLA's own write-up says it asked more than 1,500 adolescents aged 10 to 24, in a demographic mix that closely reflects the latest US Census on race and gender.

The AI finding is the one most likely to surprise a creator. Asked how they felt when they watched a story about AI, the top two emotions on the report's page are fascinated, at 28.2%, and excited, at 25.6%. The report adds that as adolescents aged up, the feeling of doom increased while excitement decreased. UCLA's write-up puts figures on that drift: 44.2% of 10- to 13-year-olds called programs about AI fascinating, while doom was the dominant emotion for 27.4% of participants aged 19 and up, against 17.7% who felt excited.

What the Teens and Screens survey measured

The AI question asked how young people feel about watching a story that involves AI. It did not ask how they feel about stories made with AI tools, and the report does not test whether a viewer would watch a clip they knew was generated. The gap between these numbers and the loudest takes about synthetic actors and slop is real, but this survey does not measure it. Younger teens are the least wary cohort and the oldest are the most, so the age of the viewer moves the answer.

The survey also speaks to creator-led casting. More respondents said they would cast a new actor, 39.8%, than a known one, 38.2%, and only 16.8% would cast an influencer. That is a useful data point for anyone building a talking-head or virtual-host format around a name the audience already follows.

Euronews covered the report on October 24 and adds a figure the report's summary page does not print: TikTok scored highest among social platforms at 64.2%. Euronews also reports that the report's authors, Yalda T. Uhls and Stephanie Rivas-Lara, frame young audiences as the new gatekeepers. Separately, 55% of respondents told the survey they want more neurodivergent characters, and only 22.7% think today's portrayals ring true most of the time. On romance, 63.8% would rather a story focus on the friendship of a couple than on sex, a 2.9% increase from 2025.

For someone making video for this audience, the number to hold onto is the age gradient. The cohort most open to AI on screen is the youngest. The report measures feelings about watching, not about making, so it does not promise an audience for AI-made work. It does say the audience is less hostile to the idea than the argument assumes.

The 2026 Teens and Screens report is free to read at scholarsandstorytellers.com/teens-screens-26, alongside the center's prior-year reports.