Do you remember when it was said that artificial intelligence would take our jobs and people wouldn’t have much to do? So far, this doesn’t seem to be happening.
Researchers at ActivTrak analyzed the digital activity of over 10,000 employees and found that once people started using AI, their professional lives became more intense, not more relaxed, writes The Atlantic.
Time spent on email, messaging apps, and chat platforms doubled. At the same time, the use of business applications increased by 94%.
Researchers at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley, found that by using AI, employees began taking on tasks they used to outsource, as activities like programming and engineering became easier to accomplish.
They started working in the evenings, on weekends, in waiting rooms, and whenever they had a few free moments and AI was at their disposal. They also began multitasking much more, overseeing multiple bots simultaneously performing different tasks.
The general pattern indicated by research is that many people do not use the time saved by AI to work less, but to take on new responsibilities.
AI also seems to change both employees' and their managers' expectations regarding the amount of work that can be done in a single day. Each hour seems busier but also more chaotic.
One of the defining principles of the new era of artificial intelligence is this: when intelligence becomes abundant, will gains value. Those who will make a difference will not be the ones seeking comfort and passively using AI to work less. They will be the ones striving to improve themselves and actively engaging with AI to develop their own mental capacities and achieve more.
In other words, what will set people apart will not be how intelligent they are, but their relationship with mental effort. Currently, some people have what psychologists call a high need for cognition. They enjoy thinking deeply. They are the ones who relish challenging games and demanding books.
At the other end of the spectrum are "cognitive misers": individuals for whom intense thinking is unpleasant and who take every opportunity to avoid it.
Between these extremes are those with a moderate need for cognition. They exert intellectual effort when they truly care about a subject but do not naturally enjoy the process. The need for cognition is correlated with intelligence, but it is not the same thing. We all know highly intelligent people who simply do not like to work hard.
In the current conditions, people will have very different experiences with artificial intelligence.
Productive Passengers
People with a low need for cognition will tend to use AI to think less. Their great gain is that AI will make them more productive, as it greatly simplifies tasks. Their great loss is that AI will diminish their mental capacities, precisely because it makes tasks so easy.
God created us in such a way that we cannot gain benefits without a certain discomfort and rewards without effort. This principle is as true in intellectual work as it is in bodybuilding. People learn best when they are in the zone of optimal difficulty, that is, when they tackle tasks that are challenging enough to engage them but not so difficult as to overwhelm them, nor so easy as to require no effort.
AI risks taking those who avoid effort out of this optimal learning zone. A research team led by Nataliya Kosmyna from the MIT Media Lab found that brain connectivity decreases by up to 55% when people use ChatGPT compared to situations where they solve similar tasks without its help.
Vivienne Ming, co-founder of Possibility Sciences, found that when people use AI, gamma wave activity – an indicator of cognitive effort – decreases by about 40%.
This has predictable effects on memory. People remember less from work done with the help of AI. Equally predictable are the effects on their thinking abilities. A study by Michael Gerlich from the SBS Swiss Business School identified "a significant negative correlation between frequent use of AI tools and critical thinking skills."
Initially, AI captivates you. Indeed, you become more productive using it. But over time, it risks depleting your skills as you become less capable and less well-informed. The saddest cases are those of individuals who get used to relying on this AI "crutch" and then have to cope without it. Researchers led by Grace Liu from Carnegie Mellon University subjected participants to such an experience and concluded: "After just about 10 minutes of problem-solving with AI assistance, individuals who had their AI access revoked performed worse and gave up more often than those who had never used AI."
A study on endoscopy specialists – who use flexible probes to examine the body's interior – showed that before using AI, they identified precancerous intestinal lesions in 28.4% of colonoscopies. After starting to use AI and then having it withdrawn, their detection rate dropped to just 22.4%. Their diagnostic ability had deteriorated significantly.
Reluctant Optimizers
People with a moderate need for cognition will understand that AI can diminish their intellectual capacities. This perspective will genuinely concern them. They will decide, with sincerity and the best intentions, not to fall into this trap. However, in the fast-paced and stressful rhythm of daily life, they will gradually be drawn to the convenience offered by AI. Their determination will give in, and they will end up depending too much on bots.
AI is a seductive technology. Researchers at the MIT Media Lab observed that when participants were asked to use ChatGPT to write a series of papers, they increasingly relied on AI from one paper to the next. In a short time, they mostly ended up copying and pasting text generated by the system.
This did not happen just because users became more tired as they worked. The technology subtly changed their way of thinking. Traditional educational institutions are built around a cultivation mentality: you work hard, go through difficult tasks, and thus become a better thinker and a better-prepared person. Modern technology, on the other hand, is built around an optimization mentality: you find a machine that makes everything easier so that you can accomplish as much as possible with maximum efficiency.
Mind Marathoners
Now we come to people with a high need for cognition and how they will fare in the upcoming era: probably like marathoners. A car is an excellent technology to cover 42.195 kilometers. Practically, there is no reason for anyone to train to run this distance. And yet, some people do. They choose to make this effort because they want to achieve something – they want to extend their own capacities.
People with a high need for cognition are similar when it comes to thinking. You probably belong to this group if the following situation is familiar to you: you've been working on a project for a while. You have no idea how you will finish it. The deadline is approaching, and anxiety is rising.
And yet, you have full confidence that you will find the solution. Rationally, you know you have failed in the past and that you might fail this time too. But at the same time, you feel deep down that you will succeed in finding the answer. You search, brainstorm, try different approaches, and then, as if by magic, one day the solution comes to you. From that moment on, the learning curve becomes exponential. Some people detest the stress caused by such a situation, but it is precisely for these moments that mind marathoners live.
A research team led by John Cacioppo from the University of Chicago analyzed over 100 studies on people with a high need for cognition. They tend to have many thoughts related to the tasks they perform. They engage in intellectually stimulating conversations. They also show a strong need to reach clear conclusions and to maintain control. Once they have formed a conclusion, it is often very difficult to make them change it, even when contrary evidence accumulates.
In the era of artificial intelligence, mind marathoners will make serious efforts to resist the intellectual entropy that AI can induce. They will feel a strong need to be original. In this epoch, cultural creation will seem increasingly familiar as texts, songs, and movies become more and more syntheses of things already produced. Mind marathoners, on the other hand, will want to create works that bear the stamp of their own personalities, that reflect their uniqueness. They will seek ways to use AI to amplify their autonomy and capacity for action, not to diminish them.