Future of Advertising: University Students on AI Technologies

The current transformations in the media industry are fueled by the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence and evolving consumer patterns. The article describes the trends and forecasts in the advertising industry over the next 20–30 years from the perspective of marketing research and media communication theory. The methodology employed a qualitative approach and the method of focus groups. Such facilitation techniques as Aquarium and Me, We, Us made it possible to collect individual opinions, whose synergistic effect enhanced the reliability of prognostic judgments. The authors obtained expert assessments from the university students of advertising and PR as future actors in the media industry. The respondents anticipated the dominance of generative content, strong emotional impact, conciseness, and interactivity in advertising communications. They expressed their concern about superficial content, fakes, and the devaluation of professional skills. In addition, they highlighted ethics and corporate social responsibility as important for content formation. According to the students, the inevitable synergistic partnership of people and technology will eventually shape a new paradigm of media communications founded on trust, personalization, and technologically fortified consumer interaction.