We’re seeing a lot of students, teachers, and scientists produce more, and worse, outputs because of improper AI use. It’s possible to use it better: Have it imitate a critic. Learning and creativity come from getting criticism and experiencing friction.

We found that when knowledge workers intentionally use AI to challenge their ideas – to generate friction – they can significantly improve their performance. Previous research on human-AI collaboration for loan evaluations had similar results.

A study I was not involved with found that creative writers produce better copy when they use AI as a sounding board rather than to ghostwrite.