How People Experience Digital Life: Human Experience Baseline

This page summarises findings from the Human Clarity Institute’s Human Experience Baseline dataset, based on 1,514 responses across six English-speaking countries. The dataset provides a broad baseline profile of human experience in digital life, including values clarity, agency, attention, trust, decision clarity, stress, digital fatigue, and interaction with digital or AI-powered systems.

Unlike narrower topic-specific HCI datasets, this baseline is designed primarily as a longitudinal reference point. Its role is to establish where core human experience signals stand at baseline so that future measurement waves can identify whether these signals strengthen, weaken, or remain stable over time.

View the Human Experience Baseline Dataset

What the baseline measures

The Human Experience Baseline dataset establishes a reference point for how adults currently experience key dimensions of life in a digital environment. Rather than focusing on a single topic, it measures a wider set of foundational signals that reflect human clarity, orientation, and functioning in everyday life.

These measures include clarity about what matters, ability to maintain focus, perceived agency over life direction, confidence in decision-making, trust in everyday information, stress, and digital fatigue. Together, they form a baseline profile that can be tracked over time using the same constructs and response scales.

Why baseline measurement matters

Baseline datasets provide the reference point needed to detect long-term change. Without an initial measurement, it is not possible to determine whether core human signals are improving, declining, or remaining stable as digital systems and AI tools become more embedded in daily life.

This dataset allows HCI to examine future changes in attention, agency, decision clarity, trust, and values alignment against a documented starting point. That makes it a foundational dataset within the broader HCI research programme.

What the data shows

These signals are presented as baseline reference measures and are not intended to replace or compete with topic-specific datasets. Each signal is explored in greater depth in its corresponding HCI dataset.

Six baseline signals stand out most clearly in this dataset: most respondents report a clear sense of what matters to them, most report being able to stay focused, most feel able to shape the direction of their life, and most report clarity when making decisions. At the same time, trust in everyday information is more mixed, and a meaningful minority report feeling mentally drained by their digital environment.

Taken together, these baseline signals suggest a population with generally strong values clarity, perceived agency, and self-reported focus, alongside more mixed trust in information and a meaningful minority experiencing digital fatigue. As a baseline dataset, the importance of these figures lies not only in what they show now, but in how they can be compared against future measurement waves.

By the numbers (from HCI data)

Patterns observed in the data

These patterns describe baseline conditions across multiple dimensions of human experience and should be interpreted as reference points rather than topic-specific findings.

Values clarity is one of the strongest baseline signals

The strongest positive signal on the page is that most respondents report a clear sense of what matters most to them. This suggests that meaning-related orientation remains relatively intact for much of the sample, and provides a useful anchor for future longitudinal comparisons involving purpose, priorities, and values alignment.

Agency and attention remain comparatively strong at baseline

Most respondents also report being able to stay focused and feeling able to shape the direction of their life. These are important protective signals because they reflect perceived control and functional capacity rather than simply mood or opinion. They suggest that many respondents still feel capable of directing attention and action in everyday life.

Decision clarity is present, but less secure than values clarity

Decision clarity remains positive overall, but it sits below values clarity, focus, and agency. That gap may matter. It can indicate that people may still know broadly what matters to them while feeling less certain in specific day-to-day judgements, especially in complex or information-heavy environments.

Trust in everyday information is more mixed than other core signals

Only 45% report generally trusting the information they encounter, making trust one of the weakest topline signals on the page. This stands out because it suggests that epistemic confidence may be less stable than agency, focus, or values clarity within the same baseline sample.

Digital fatigue is not universal, but it is established

A minority report feeling mentally drained by their digital environment, but the proportion is still large enough to matter. This means digital fatigue is not simply a fringe signal. It is already present in the baseline and should be monitored over time alongside focus, trust, and stress.

What these findings suggest

This baseline dataset suggests that many adults still report relatively strong internal orientation in digital life. Most respondents describe clear values, perceived agency, and an ability to stay focused, which together indicate that core human clarity signals remain intact for much of the sample.

At the same time, the data also show friction points. Trust in everyday information is notably less settled than values or agency, and a meaningful minority report digital fatigue and elevated stress. That combination matters because it suggests that even where internal orientation remains strong, the surrounding information environment may still be placing pressure on clarity and confidence.

As future HCI measurement waves are added, this dataset will help determine whether these foundational signals hold steady, strengthen, or weaken over time. That is the central purpose of the Human Experience Baseline.

Methodology

This dataset forms part of the Human Clarity Institute’s broader baseline measurement programme, examining how adults experience core dimensions of human life in digital environments. The study uses a cross-sectional online survey design and is intended primarily as a baseline reference dataset for future longitudinal comparison.

Data were collected on 04/02/2026 and published on 05/02/2026. The cleaned dataset contains 1,514 responses across Australia, United Kingdom, United States, Ireland, Canada, and New Zealand. All data were collected as part of HCI’s open research programme.

Sampling & study notes

• Final n: 1,514
• Countries: Australia, United Kingdom, United States, Ireland, Canada, New Zealand
• Study type: Cross-sectional online survey
• Purpose: Baseline measurement for future repeated-wave comparison
• Construct coverage: Meaning Coherence, Attention Capacity, Behavioural Alignment, Agency, Trust, Cognitive Load, wellbeing-related context signals

This dataset should be interpreted as a descriptive, non-causal baseline profile rather than a nationally representative population estimate. Its primary value lies in documenting a clear measurement starting point for future HCI tracking.

The cleaned dataset, variable dictionary, and reuse terms are publicly available through the HCI dataset repository: Human Experience Baseline Dataset →

Data integrity

All percentages reported on this page are calculated from valid responses in the cleaned dataset. Percentages are rounded to the nearest whole number for readability. Unless otherwise stated, summary percentages refer to the stated grouping for that item, such as 5–7, 1–3, 4–5, or a named response category.

Item bases vary slightly across the page due to missing responses. Where questions use grouped score bands, 5-point items, or named response categories, the wording on the page makes that explicit.

This dataset is exploratory and descriptive in nature. It does not support causal inference and results should be interpreted as observed baseline patterns within the survey sample.

As additional waves are fielded using the same constructs and response scales, this baseline will support direct comparison across time for key human experience indicators in digital life.

Data use and reuse terms are outlined in our Data Use & Disclaimer.

Explore further analysis on Human Clarity Insights, or browse the full collection of HCI research reports.