Editor’s Note: Six months after Foresight Factory published Trending 2026, AI adoption is accelerating, purchasing is becoming more politicized, and the search for human meaning is intensifying, here’s what brands need to know.
Six months into 2026, the consumer landscape looks even more complex than when we published our Trending 2026 report. The war in Iran and the subsequent blocking of the Strait of Hormuz have driven up inflation and squeezed supply chains globally. AI has continued its rapid advance – and faced growing opposition.
Against this backdrop, we wanted to revisit the nine energized consumer behaviors across four opportunity spaces that we identified in Trending 2026, exploring how each consumer trend has developed in the months since – what has changed, what has accelerated, and what brands need to understand heading into the second half of 2026.
1) Cognitive Crossroads: How Are Consumers Navigating the Tension Between Human Agency and AI Partnership?
When we published Trending 2026, we identified Cognitive Crossroads as one of the defining opportunity spaces of the year – the space where consumers navigate evolving tensions between human agency and technological partnership. Six months in, that tension has only deepened.
Tech Harmony: Why Is AI Adoption Still Growing Despite the Controversy?
Even amid ongoing debate around AI, its environmental cost, its role in employment disruption, and its occasional high-profile failures, adoption continues to climb. Our latest consumer data shows that 65% of consumers globally have now used generative AI, up from 52% in 2025 (source: Foresight Factory, 2026). More and more brands are establishing a presence on ChatGPT and other AI providers to engage consumers directly in relevant channels.
As agentic AI increasingly makes decisions on consumers’ behalf, a new risk is emerging for brands: branding bypass. When an AI assistant is doing the choosing, brands that are not visible inside those interfaces may simply be skipped. Generative engine optimization (GEO) – the practice of ensuring brand visibility within AI-generated search results – is becoming a strategic priority as a result.
Consumers are also getting creative in how they use AI to their own advantage. Some are creating “shallowfakes”, manipulated images of, for instance, a damaged delivery, to obtain refunds from companies. Instances of such microfraud are on the rise, including in insurance claims. Elsewhere, some online creators are using digital twins (AI-generated replicas of themselves) to extend their presence without being involved in every output. Across these behaviors, a consistent theme emerges: AI is no longer something that simply happens to consumers, they are actively shaping how it works for them.
Q&A: What Brands Are Asking About AI and Consumer Behavior in 2026
- What is generative engine optimization, and why does it matter for brands right now?
Generative engine optimization (GEO) refers to strategies that help brands remain visible and recommended within AI-generated responses, whether via ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, or similar platforms. As agentic AI increasingly handles product discovery and purchasing decisions on consumers’ behalf, brands that are not surfaced within these AI interfaces risk being bypassed entirely. For brand strategists, GEO is fast becoming as critical as traditional SEO, and Foresight Factory’s consumer intelligence data signals this shift is already underway.
Human Autonomy: Is the Pushback Against AI Becoming a Mainstream Consumer Trend?
Human Autonomy – which can be viewed as the counterforce to Tech Harmony, is gathering real strength. Around 2 in 3 consumers globally now agree that too much of what they see on social media is AI-generated (source: Foresight Factory, 2026), and fatigue with low-quality AI content – so-called “AI slop” – is growing.
The desire for human mastery is showing up in unexpected places. The viral website Your AI Slop Bores Me, launched in March 2026, lets users submit questions to anonymous human volunteers rather than a chatbot, and lets others role-play as AI in a gamified format. This phenomenon signals that some consumers are not just tolerating human imperfection, they are actively seeking it out as a form of connection and authenticity.
Employment is another flashpoint. Two in 3 consumers globally agree that companies should prioritize employing humans over robots or automated services, even if it means higher prices (source: Foresight Factory, 2026). Philosophy and intellectual pursuits are becoming more fashionable as consumers resist outsourcing their critical thinking, and tactile, hands-on activities continue to grow in appeal as a counterweight to digital overload.
In publishing, Books by People launched its Organic Literature Certification in October 2025, verifying that books were written by humans with limited AI use. Half of GB consumers agree that AI-generated content is blander than human-created content, up from 44% in 2024 and rising to 57% among 55–64s (source: Foresight Factory, 2025). Certification models for human creativity may well expand beyond publishing into music, art, and journalism.
Three More Opportunity Spaces: What Has Developed in 2026?
Strategic Spending: How Are Cost and Values Reshaping Consumer Purchase Decisions in 2026?
Consumers are weighing every purchase and brand interaction through a dual lens of value and values – and 2026 has given them even more reasons to do so on both fronts.
On the Politicized Purchasing side, the US/Israeli attack on Iran has intensified anti-American sentiment globally, with tourism to the US declining as America’s cultural pull weakens. Businesses are actively seeking to reduce their dependency on US suppliers and platforms in response to unpredictable geoeconomic policies. Meanwhile, OpenAI faced backlash after it cut a controversial deal with the US Department of War, with many consumers opting to switch from ChatGPT to Claude as a result. In September 2025, Lush closed all 100 of its UK stores, its factories, and its website for a day in protest against the situation in Gaza – absorbing an estimated £300,000 (c. $402,900) loss in the process (source: Lush/LBC, 2025).
On the Pinched Pragmatism side, a majority of global consumers (56%) consider financial hardship to be a personal risk in the next five years (source: Foresight Factory, 2026). Brand switching is getting easier: 51% of global consumers say they regularly switch companies or service providers to get the best deals, up from 46% in 2023. And 1 in 3 say they would be willing to buy a brand recommended by an AI assistant, even if they had never heard of it before, a finding with significant implications for brand loyalty strategies heading into H2 2026.
Q&A: Understanding Politicized Purchasing and Pinched Pragmatism
- Are consumers really making purchasing decisions based on brand politics in 2026?
Yes – and the evidence is mounting. Foresight Factory’s 2026 consumer data captures a consumer population increasingly willing to act on their values at the checkout. From the global backlash against US brands following geopolitical events, to Lush’s high-profile protest closure, brand politics are no longer a peripheral concern – they are a commercial variable. At the same time, financial pressure through Pinched Pragmatism means many consumers are balancing conviction with cost, making brand-switching easier and more frequent than ever.
New Belief Systems: Why Are Consumers Turning to Spirituality and Tradition Amid Global Disruption?
Faced with institutional decline and geopolitical disruption, consumers continue to search for grounding – whether through new spiritual practices or a return to traditional frameworks.
On the Next-Gen Spirituality front, the intersection of AI and spiritual belief has become a genuine battleground. Pope Leo XIV’s May 2026 encyclical “Magnifica Humanitas” addressed AI’s impact on the workforce, the spread of deepfakes, and the sanctity of the human spirit. The Guardian has documented a growing pattern of consumers using AI as a genuine spiritual conduit, with some becoming convinced they have received a religious calling through ChatGPT – a development experts warn risks becoming a mirror for self-worship rather than genuine growth.
On the Trad Revival side, Bible sales in the UK hit a record high in 2025, up 134% since 2019, the highest since records began — reportedly driven by younger consumers seeking meaning. The MAHA movement’s new federal dietary guidelines frame ultra-processed food as a national crisis, with 2 in 5 men and 3 in 5 16–24s in the US saying they plan to change their eating habits based on the new guidance (source: Foresight Factory, 2026).
Lifemaxxing: How Are Consumers Redefining Fulfillment and Life Milestones in 2026?
Consumers continue to redefine meaningful life milestones on their own terms – and 2026 has brought new signals across all three behaviors in this space.
Home ownership remains a strong aspiration, but less so among younger generations. 72% of Gen Z in GB and 73% in the US say it is important to own their own home, compared to 80% of GB Millennials and 78% of US Millennials (source: Foresight Factory, 2026). Meanwhile, phone-free experiences are surging as consumers push back against performance culture: phone-free events grew 567% globally between 2024 and 2025 (source: Eventbrite), and 63% of global consumers say they are actively seeking experiences that allow full presence, free from screens and notifications (source: Foresight Factory, 2026).
And in the longevity space, commercial interest continues to accelerate – though a counter-narrative is now emerging. Researchers have identified what they are calling “longevity fixation syndrome” – a compulsive fixation on lifespan extension. And the Global Wellness Summit named the over-optimization backlash as its defining theme for 2026.
Read the Trending 2026 Preview Report
The behaviors and opportunity spaces covered in this mid-year review build on the full analysis published in Foresight Factory’s Trending 2026: The Adaptation Advantage report last October. For the complete picture – including deep dives into Strategic Spending, New Belief Systems, and Lifemaxxing, sector-specific opportunities, and strategic actions for your brand – download the Trending 2026 preview report below.
Click here to download the Trending 2026 preview report.
