Unless you have been living under a rock, you’d know that artificial intelligence (AI) euphoria is taking over the world and the enthusiasm is not merely limited to the business and investing communities. While companies are using AI to build better products and services, professionals are using it to assist in their work. Students aren’t far behind with many already using it to assist in their studies and projects. However, new research has shown that kids who used ChatGPT as a study assistant did worse in tests compared to those who did not use AI tools.

For context, a study by researchers at Wharton University and Pennsylvania University conducted on nearly 1,000 school math students in Turkey showed that using GenAI tools makes it tougher for kids to learn and acquire new skills – even as it helps improve their performance in the short term.

Research Shows Using ChatGPT Hampered Kids’ Ability to Learn

The researchers divided the group into three. They gave one group a GPT Base version while another was given a GPT Tutor version which has an interface similar to ChatGPT-4 but with safeguards. The third group – which was named the “control group” wasn’t given any technology assistance. This group relied only on traditional resources like textbooks and notes for assistance.

The research shows that the performance of the group that had the assistance of the GPT base was 48% better than the control group. However, they performed 17% worse than the control group without AI assistance.

The group that had the GPT Tutor version, performed 127% better in the practice session that was assisted by AI. However, without the assistance, their performance was similar to the control group.

As Wharton professor Hamsa Bastani who co-authored the paper said, “We’re really worried that if humans don’t learn, if they start using these tools as a crutch and rely on it, then they won’t actually build those fundamental skills to be able to use these tools effectively in the future.”

Using AI Without Guardrails Can Be Problematic

While the report emphasizes the productivity boost from using AI, it warns against using it unhindered. The researchers found that students are using AI chatbots as a “crutch” – and instead of building their own skills, they were simply asking the chatbots for answers.

According to Bastani, “if we use it sort of lazily and kind of outsource the work that we’re supposed to be doing and completely trust the machine learning model, then that’s when we could be in trouble.”

Another problem with AI models like ChatGPT is that often they do not give the correct answers as the models are still far from perfect. Remember, they are more similar to your phone predicting the next word you’re going to type than an actual general intelligence system so they often conjure totally incorrect answers. However, most students don’t know that so they take their answers at face value which can be problematic in both the short and long term. Also, students are overconfident about ChatGPT’s ability to tutor them and in a survey that was done alongside the experiment, students said that they don’t believe that using the chatbot caused them to learn less.

Importantly, after the test, those using AI tutor were confident that they had done much better than what they would have done without the assistance. However, that was not the case, as the results tell us.

ChatGPT is getting quite popular among kids and research from Pew last year showed that 13% of teens aged between 13 and 17 in the US have used ChatGPT for their schoolwork. The survey showed that teens in higher grade levels were more likely to use ChatGPT.

The survey also explored whether kids believe it is acceptable to use the AI chatbot. Around 70% of teens who have heard of ChatGPT say it’s acceptable to use it while researching something new. However, 13% say it is not acceptable to use ChatGPT.

According to the Pew survey, “Just one-in-five teens who have heard of ChatGPT say it’s acceptable to use it to write essays, while 57% say it is not acceptable.” When specifically asked about using ChatGPT to solve math problems, 39% said it was acceptable while 36% found it unacceptable.

genAI tools used by teens
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Schools Are Curtailing Use of Generative AI Tools

Turnitin, a popular plagiarism-detection company, went through 200 million writing assignments and found that while 10% used AI in some form, 3% were largely generated using generative AI tools. These results are almost certainly skewed lower too because students who know that their assignments will be checked for AI will be much less likely to use it (and those who do will try to hide it).

With many students blatantly using AI tools like ChatGPT for cheating, many schools have barred their use while some others ask for disclosures if such tools were used.

Teachers are now also using AI detection tools to find out if students are doing their work through support from AI tools. A survey by the Center for Democracy and Technology showed that 68% of the surveyed middle and high school teachers used an AI detection tool. Unfortunately, these AI detector tools are all over the place and the research shows that they aren’t anywhere near reliable enough to accuse students of using AI. Essays from innocent students, especially those who aren’t native English speakers, are often flagged as entirely written by AI, even when AI wasn’t used at all.

Meanwhile, while it might not be possible to prevent teens from using AI tools like ChatGPT as they are freely available, there are some actions that their schools and guardians can take.

Tara Nattrass, the managing director of innovation and strategy at ISTE+ASCD has an idea. “We need to reframe the conversation and engage with students around the ways in which AI can support them in their learning and the ways in which it may be detrimental to their learning,” said Nattrass in an email to Education Week.

She added, “We want students to know that activities like using AI to write essays and pass them off as their own is harmful to their learning while using AI to break down difficult topics to strengthen understanding can help them in their learning.”

Other teachers, like Professor Victor Stater at LSU, are going back to the basics by returning to in-class hand-written essays.

ChatGPT Should Be Used Judicially by All

Students (like everyone else) are always finding ways to make their job easier so naturally they are going to use the incredible AI tools on offer. Incidentally, while tools like calculators and Excel formulas have reduced the need to do arithmetic by themselves – relying upon them for every small calculation has its own pitfalls.

As the technology evolves, the smart ones will figure out how to effectively use AI for assistance. The problem however might be more acute with children, many of whom might not be able to strike the right balance between AI and doing things by themselves.

AI is both a boon and a bane for students as a study by the University of South Carolina showed. That study, which is aptly titled “AI can help − and hurt − student creativity” found “that AI can be a useful brainstorming tool, quickly generating ideas that can spark creative exploration. But there are also potential negative effects on students’ creative thinking skills and self-confidence.”

That said, ultimately, GenAI tools like ChatGPT are just yet another technology and should be used in limitation, just as social media and smartphones. While these have become necessities in a way and using them in moderation is actually helpful, their overdose can be bad.