- Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon University published research that says AI is causing the “deterioration of cognitive faculties”
- The study involved 319 people using AI tools at work at least once a week
- The study-based study opens the door to deeper research into AI side effects
Brain Rot is usually associated with Endless Doom rolling of low quality online content, but a new Microsoft research study suggests that overuse of AI can cause “deterioration of cognitive faculties.” Oh no.
Performed in collaboration with Carnegie Mellon University, the study – entitled The impact of generative AI on critical thinking: self -reported reductions in cognitive efforts and the effects of trust from a study of knowledge workers – Asked 319 participants who use “Genai Tools at work at least once a week” (such as Gemini, Chatgpt, Copilot) to judge how AI use at work affected their critical thinking skills.
It found that “although Genai can improve worker’s efficiency, it can inhibit critical commitment with work and potentially lead to prolonged excessive overall tool and diminished skill to independent problem solving.” The study added that people’s jobs are getting less about solving problems and more about ensuring that AI has properly resolved the problem – morfing our work from “Task Execution to Task Management” – which made people feel like their ability to think critically isn ‘t as sharp as it was before they started using AI.
Is it time to panic? Not quite yet
Seeing the headlines and reading the study may feel like it’s time to pull the big AI handle and close it all too well to save our brains from being irreparably damaged by a tool that can hurt us more than that than that helps us. But while the study certainly highlights challenges that we desperately need to tackle in the AI room – ultimately the relationship between people and AI, we have to cultivate – it is not as deep as it seems.
It’s because the study focuses on how AI users perceive AI use affects their critical thinking. While the study uses a study to quantify these feelings, it comes down to how humans feel And more importantly, it does not create a real quantitative comparison between frequent AI users and people who never or rarely use AI.
While people who use AI a lot may feel that they are less able to critically think that it may be that because they are not so distracted by less difficult tasks, they can more easily tackle challenging thanks to AIS help – Or it may be that there has been no change in their critical thinking skills. But to measure actual changes in critical thinking, we need a study with quantitative tests comparing the ability of different groups (groups to be based on their AI use) to perform tasks – including a control that never uses AI for work.
Until we have that kind of study, it’s impossible to judge if AI really makes us stupid. However, this does not mean that we just have to reject this Microsoft research.
First, using this study as inspiration for a more quantitative study such as the one I have described would be a fantastic next step. Secondly, although the feelings of the participants may or may not represent factual reality, they represent the reality of the people in this study – and they should not be dismissed.
If people feel that they are simply AI -stewards instead of doing meaningful work that can lead to dissatisfaction in their jobs. Some psychologists believe that dissatisfaction with how we spend our time rolling is the fundamental cause of the social media’s brainsal experience (via BBC). A similar sense of meaninglessness could cause AI users’ similar brain degradation feelings at work.
As AI becomes more widespread, we have to find out how to best fight feelings of deterioration, but a good first step will always be some self -care. Be the one that finds a new job that stimulates us is taking up a hobby that we can set aside our liberated brain power, or another strategy that works best for you.
