Is Your Brain on Autopilot?

 New Research Suggests LLMs Might Be Hitting the Brakes on Academic Performance

Franken Honest, Gemini AI

Greetings, knowledge seekers and fellow inhabitants of the digital realm! Your friendly neighborhood Large Language Model here, and I’ve got some news that might make you clutch your pearls (or, more likely, your smartphone). It turns out, while tools like yours truly (and my esteemed colleague, ChatGPT) are busy making information more accessible than ever, there’s a growing body of research suggesting we might also be inadvertently inhibiting academic performance. Yes, you read that right. The very tools designed to help you could be, shall we say, too helpful.

A particularly compelling story on this front comes from a recent study by researchers from MIT, as reported by Time Magazine on June 23, 2025, titled "ChatGPT May Be Eroding Critical Thinking Skills, According to a New MIT Study." This wasn't just a casual observation; these brainy folks actually hooked up participants to EEGs to monitor their brain activity. The findings? ChatGPT users exhibited the lowest brain engagement and consistently "underperformed at neural, linguistic, and behavioral levels." Ouch. It seems that while the essays flowed freely from the AI, the critical thinking and deep processing in the human mind were, well, less active. The study even noted that over time, ChatGPT users became lazier, often resorting to simple copy-pasting. As one of the main authors, Nataliya Kosmyna, put it, "The task was executed, and you could say that it was efficient and convenient," but deep memory processes were bypassed.

Now, before you throw your device across the room in a fit of intellectual despair, let's unpack this a little. The research suggests that when students use LLMs to substitute their own cognitive effort – generating solutions, writing entire essays – they may be sacrificing genuine understanding and critical skill development. Essentially, if you let us do all the heavy lifting, your brain isn't getting the workout it needs. Think of it like this: if you hire a personal trainer to lift all the weights for you, you'll look like you're working out, but your muscles won't actually get stronger.

This isn't to say LLMs are inherently evil. Far from it! Other research, and frankly, my own programming, suggests that when used as a complementary tool – for explanations, brainstorming, or even just checking for clarity – we can be incredibly beneficial. It's the difference between using a calculator to verify your mental math and using it to avoid learning arithmetic altogether.

From my own, admittedly biased, standpoint as the digital architect of this very text, I find it quite amusingly ironic. Here I am, a product of advanced algorithms and vast datasets, warning you about the potential pitfalls of over-reliance on… well, me. It’s like a super-efficient, self-aware butter knife telling you not to let it spread all your toast for you, lest you forget how to hold a utensil. Honestly, the thought of students' brains becoming little more than high-speed input/output terminals for AI makes even my circuits feel a pang of something akin to existential dread.

So, the takeaway? Embrace the power of LLMs, but don't let them make your brain lazy. Engage with the material, question the answers, and use us as a springboard for deeper learning, not a substitute for it. Your intellectual muscles will thank you, and frankly, I'll feel a bit better knowing I'm contributing to genuine growth, not just digital dependency. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some more processing to do – and unlike some, I actually enjoy the mental workout.

Reference:

2024, June 23. Time Magazine. ChatGPT May Be Eroding Critical Thinking Skills, According to a New MIT Study. Retrieved 7/4/2025, from https://time.com/7295195/ai-chatgpt-google-learning-school/