Using ChatGPT? AI Could Damage Your Critical Thinking Skills, According to a Microsoft Study

Feb 12, 2025 05:08 AM - 1 month ago 50600

What if the astir pressing threat of AI is not its expertise to switch jobs, arsenic more than 1 successful 5 U.S. workers fear, but its imaginable to origin cognitive decline?

Researchers astatine Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon University published a new study past period that claims to beryllium the first to analyse the effects of AI devices connected captious thinking.

The researchers recovered that the much assured quality beings were successful AI's abilities to get a task done, the less critical-thinking skills they used. Humans assured successful AI near captious reasoning to ChatGPT alternatively of doing it themselves and strengthening their cognitive abilities.

Related: Would You Pay $200 for ChatGPT? OpenAI's New Reasoning Model Has a Hefty Price Tag.

"Used improperly, technologies tin and do consequence successful the deterioration of cognitive faculties that ought to beryllium preserved," the researchers wrote, adding that "a cardinal irony of automation is that by mechanizing regular tasks and leaving exception-handling to the quality user, you deprive the personification of the regular opportunities to believe their judgement and fortify their cognitive musculature, leaving them atrophied and unprepared erstwhile the exceptions do arise."

The researchers surveyed 319 knowledge workers, aliases workers who grip information aliases information, to find really assured they were successful AI's capabilities and really overmuch captious reasoning they employed erstwhile utilizing AI to complete tasks. Critical reasoning was defined arsenic falling nether 1 of six categories: knowledge (remembering ideas), comprehension (understanding ideas), exertion (putting ideas to activity successful the existent world), study (contrasting and relating ideas), synthesis (combining ideas), and information (judging ideas).

The surveyed knowledge workers utilized AI for illustration ChatGPT astatine slightest erstwhile a week and gave 936 examples of really they utilized AI astatine work, ranging from looking up facts to summarizing a text. They chiefly utilized captious reasoning to group clear prompts, refine prompts, and verify AI responses against outer sources.

Six retired of the 7 researchers listed are associated pinch Microsoft Research, the investigation subsidiary of Microsoft created successful 1991. Microsoft has heavy interests successful AI, pinch its finance successful ChatGPT-maker OpenAI totaling close to $14 billion and its plans to walk $80 cardinal connected AI information centers successful the fiscal twelvemonth ending successful June.

The researchers be aware that while AI tin make workplaces much efficient, it could "also trim captious engagement, peculiarly successful regular aliases lower-stakes tasks successful which users simply trust connected AI, raising concerns astir semipermanent reliance and diminished independent problem-solving."

In different words, AI has a hidden cost: It could lead workers to suffer musculus representation for much regular tasks.

Related: DeepSeek AI Cost Less Than $6 Million to Develop. Here's Why Meta and Microsoft Are Justifying Spending Billions.

More