“Generative AI is cognitive cancer and we are doing next to nothing to stop it from spreading.” That very aptly sums up Benjamin Riley’s coverage of what is almost certainly the first “rigorous, empirical,” large-scale study on the impact of AI on student learning.
Consistent with the two previous data sets, we again see near-perfect alignment between the Pre AI and Never AI students on the monthly closed-book exams administered to students. But now the adverse impact of AI is laid bare—just look at that shift to the left. The Used AI students are scoring at levels far lower than their Never AI peers, indeed, many score far lower than anything recorded prior to AI existing. […]
This isn’t about academic integrity, it’s about a generation of kids being told AI is “inevitable” and “the future” and acting accordingly, in a societies where we’ve yet to develop firm norms about what’s acceptable to do with these tools within education. The upshot is that students are using AI in ways that are harming their cognitive development and foreclosing their life opportunities. Harms that are not easily remediated, if at all. […]
The Edu-Cognoscenti continues to chatter about learning loss related to school closures during the pandemic. Well, the learning loss stemming from generative AI appears more substantial, it’s happening right now, and it may endure for far longer. So to all the policymakers and philanthropists and so-called thought leaders who purport to take education evidence seriously, I ask you: What are you doing to prevent ongoing educational harms of generative AI? Are you doing anything at all?
We are in cognitive crisis.
I will add one complaint. Riley ends with a quote from his friend Dan Wellingham, who says “Artificial Intelligence tools should not substitute for tasks wherein students would benefit from doing the mental work themselves. Only use AI for what you already know how to do.”
Really? Come on, smart people. This is weak sauce. A major, major, major, major part of this whole hullabaloo is in the very fact that humans can’t or are very bad at or otherwise just harm themselves by offloading cognitive tasks, period. The very category “tasks wherein students would [or would not] benefit from doing the mental work themselves” is the problem. And the idea that using AI only for things “you already know how to do” would not also be cognitively harmful also seems mildly sophomoric, especially under the circumstances.
As I have said before, offloading and short-circuiting our imaginations makes us lazy, but behind this problem, or built into it and built into our very humanness, is the fact that we don’t actually get to choose when we are offloading. Imagination thrives on randomness, friction, and surprise, but also on repetition, dedication, and constancy.
Again, even I, self-declared leader of the He-Man AI Haters Club, will disclaim some possibly-maybe-sorta-could-be good uses of AI. But Riley definitely ended on a whimper.