AI tools may weaken critical thinking skills by encouraging cognitive offloading, study suggests

[erronis]

https://www.psypost.org/ai-tools-may-weaken-critical-thinking-skills-by-encouraging-cognitive-offloading-study-suggests/

A new study published in the journal Societies suggests that frequent reliance on artificial intelligence tools may negatively affect critical thinking skills. People who used AI tools more frequently demonstrated weaker critical thinking abilities, largely due to a cognitive phenomenon known as cognitive offloading. This effect was particularly pronounced among younger individuals, while those with higher education levels tended to retain stronger critical thinking skills regardless of AI tool usage.

As AI continues to integrate into education, workplaces, and daily decision-making, researchers have raised concerns about its potential effects on cognitive skills. Critical thinking, the ability to analyze, evaluate, and synthesize information to form reasoned conclusions, is essential for problem-solving and independent decision-making. AI tools can provide users with quick solutions, but over-reliance on these tools may reduce opportunities for deep cognitive engagement.

“The motivation for this study stemmed from the increasing integration of AI tools into everyday life and their potential cognitive consequences. While AI offers efficiency and convenience, there is growing concern that reliance on these tools could diminish critical thinking abilities,” said study author Michael Gerlich, the Head of Center for Strategic Corporate Foresight and Sustainability at SBS Swiss Business School.

“Cognitive offloading, where individuals delegate cognitive tasks to AI rather than engaging in deep analytical reasoning, is an emerging phenomenon that has not been extensively studied. Given the crucial role of critical thinking in decision-making, education, and professional competence, understanding how AI influences cognitive engagement is imperative.”

Totally makes sense to me. Along the line of losing basic math skills with the invention of the abacus, slide-rule, hand-held calculator...

[flying rabbit]

1. K&R

AI makes us stupid.

[bucolic_frolic]

2. A significant % of Americans cannot be made dumber. They have nothing cognitive to offload. /nt

[EYESORE 9001]

3. You can lead a horse's ass to AI

but you can’t make him think. It amazes me how cognitively and intellectually lazy our society has become. Those who subcontract their thinking processes to algorithms will get brain atrophy.

[Scrivener7]

4. It's also the end of human creativity. It's the devil.

[Jim__]

5. Socrates warned about the dangers of reading. It would weaken our ability to memorize.

And, he was right. Our memories are weaker than those of the ancient Greeks. They used to memorize The Iliad and The Odyssey. I'm pretty sure I couldn't do that. I guess there's a trade-off. I'm not sure how much our loss of some ability to memorize things actually cost us.

From Phaedrus

SOCRATES: … Among the ancient gods of Naucratis in Egypt there was one to whom the bird called the ibis is sacred. The name of that divinity was Theuth, and it was he who first discovered number and calculation, geometry and astronomy, as well as the games of checkers and dice, and, above all else, writing.

Now the king of all Egypt at that time was Thamus, who lived in the great city in the upper region that the Greeks call Egyptian Thebes … . Theuth came to exhibit his arts to him and urged him to disseminate them to all the Egyptians. Thamus asked him about the usefulness of each art, and while Theuth was explaining it, Thamus praised him for whatever he thought was right in his explanations and criticized him for whatever he thought was wrong.

The story goes that Thamus said much to Theuth, both for and against each art, which it would take too long to repeat. But when they came to writing, Theuth said: “O King, here is something that, once learned, will make the Egyptians wiser and will improve their memory; I have discovered a potion for memory and for wisdom.” Thamus, however, replied: “O most expert Theuth, one man can give birth to the elements of an art, but only another can judge how they can benefit or harm those who will use them. And now, since you are the father of writing, your affection for it has made you describe its effects as the opposite of what they really are. In fact, it will introduce forgetfulness into the soul of those who learn it: they will not practice using their memory because they will put their trust in writing, which is external and depends on signs that belong to others, instead of trying to remember from the inside, completely on their own. You have not discovered a potion for remembering, but for reminding; you provide your students with the appearance of wisdom, not with its reality. Your invention will enable them to hear many things without being properly taught, and they will imagine that they have come to know much while for the most part they will know nothing. And they will be difficult to get along with, since they will merely appear to be wise instead of really being so.”

...

[erronis]

6. What's scary, to me at least, is that I frequently can't remember people's phone#s. They are stored in my contacts

and I never have to actually dial them.

Kids can't read analog watch faces anymore. Or read cursive script.