AI tools like ChatGPT taking over our thinking?

STUDENTS' NEAR-CONSTANT USE OF AI HIGHLIGHTS CONCERNS OVER DECLINING CREATIVITY, CRITICAL THINKING, AND REFLECTIVE SKILLS IN HIGHER EDUCATION.

- Tahaan Jayewardene

Sri Lankan students increasingly rely on Al tools like ChatGPT for academic work, often using them nearly 100% of the time. Educators warn this convenience may be eroding critical thinking, creativity, and reflection, urging students to treat Al as a tool, not a substitute for active learning and cognitive effort.

Today, technology has become an integral part of not only our day-to-day functioning but has also started to take over our thinking. How this is impacting current generations of thinkers, especially the future of our society; young thinkers, is deeply concerning.

Sri Lankan Gen-Z, and their reliance and dependence on AI, show how thinking patterns and our youth’s resilience may be impacted.

A Sri Lankan student explains how relevant this issue is;

"If you walk into the cafeteria and you see a laptop open, there'll probably be a tab saying ChatGPT or AI.”

Digging further into the issue of Al's transformational impact on our brains and thinking, leading researchers, a Sri Lankan tech expert, and a local university student, highlight growing concerns of potentially serious cognitive and learning impacts of using AI like ChatGPT.

An MIT study said that while LLMs offer immediate convenience, our findings highlight potential cognitive costs.

“Over four months, LLM users consistently underperformed at neural, linguistic, and behavioural levels,” the study said.

These findings were concluded after studying three groups of students doing essay writing tasks, one group using only ChatGPT, one using only search engines, and one designated as “brain only.”

“These results raise concerns about the longterm educational implications of LLM reliance and underscore the need for deeper inquiry into Al’s role in learning,” concludes the study titled, Your Brain on ChatGPT: Accumulation of Cognitive Debt when Using an AI Assistant for Essay Writing Task (10 June 2025).