ACM study examines how generative AI affects critical thinking
A peer-reviewed paper explores the relationship between AI tool use and human reasoning capabilities.
What to know
- An ACM-published peer-reviewed study examines the relationship between generative AI tool use and human critical thinking skills.
- The paper has reached early-stage discussion on Hacker News and social platforms with modest engagement so far.
- No specific findings or arguments from the paper are yet available in the coverage provided.
the-mitr Hacker News submitter
How it unfolded 2 developments, newest first · click a bar or a number to jump articlesposts
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Study spreads across social platforms
The paper circulates across Mastodon and other social networks, with multiple instances sharing the ACM link and Hacker News discussion thread.
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"We surveyed 319 knowledge workers who use GenAI tools (e.g., ChatGPT, Copilot) at work at least once per week, to model how they enact critical thinking when using GenAI tools, and how GenAI affects their perceived effort of thinking critically. Analysing 936 real-world GenAI tool use examples our participants shared, we find that knowledge…
2 more of the top 3 · 11 posts in this stretch
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This is my takeaway:Authors analyzed ~300 workers doing ~1000 tasks. They collected self-reported measure of using critical thinking [yes/no], and estimate of cognitive effort of doing the task. Authors also measured workers' confidence in themselves doing the task or the AI doing the task.They found: if someone is confident that AI can do the…
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I'm either not seeing something or I do not see the point of this study.Amount of "critical thinking" is basically amount of oversight, no? What's interesting is when the amount of oversight is inappropriate, leading to overconfidence in bad results (or, if too much oversight, lack of efficiency).This paper does not seem to discuss results and…
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Paper gains traction on Hacker News
The ACM study reaches Hacker News frontpage, accumulating 52 points and 37 comments as technologists and researchers begin discussing its findings.
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background
ACM publishes study on generative AI and critical thinking — A peer-reviewed paper titled "The Impact of Generative AI on Critical Thinking" appears in the ACM Digital Library, examining how generative AI affects human reasoning and analytical capabilities.
What people are saying 5 voices from 1 site · best of 11 · verbatim
- Oct 31
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> You get more done without realising you're learning lessUnfortunately, I think many folks now just don't place any value on learning or knowing things because they can "just ask AI".That's probably my biggest fear with AI is that people just don't see any value to knowing things anymore. And quite ironically, AI is amazing for learning new…
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I think the bigger issue is skipping the process through which you learn. Personally I learn the most when I am stuck on something for hours trying to figure it out and I miss all of that when AI gives a solution right away.You get more done without realising you're learning less.
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Anecdotally, does this match anyone's actual experience?Everyone I know who is working closely with LLMs is doing some of the most acute critical thinking of their lives these days.I'm very skeptical of these kinds of takes; I'm reminded that Socrates railed against books on the basis that they were going to rot the brains of the youth.
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There's often a big gap between self perception and actual performance, I wonder if this actually tracks when measured.Regardless, confidence in oneself is hardly measured, self report is likely as good as it gets.
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People have always been bad at critical thinking, it's a high level cognitive skill that requires practice.Now that it can be outsourced,we will slowly lose this ability that we barely had.