The previous pages highlighted some of the limitations and ethical conerns of GenAI and the importance of thinking critically about whether and how to use GenAI. This page will focus on the situations where GenAI assistance might be helpful in college work. As always, be sure to confirm AI usage guidelines with your instructor before using AI assistance with your coursework. 

Here are 4 scenarios where AI chatbots like ChatGPT might be appropriate to help you with your college research assignments:

1. Brainstorming ideas, topics, and research questions: When you have a new assignment, and don't know where to begin, asking ChatGPT to summarize the current state of research on a topic may be just what you need to begin the brainstorming process. Chatbots can be useful for providing entry-level knowledge on a topic in a conversational tone, but keep in mind that highly niche or emerging topics may not be covered and remember the importance of lateral reading to verify output. Library reference material are another great resource for this part of your research.

Prompt example: "I’m writing a research paper for Sociology and I need help coming up with a topic. I’m interested in topics related to climate change. Please give me a list of 10 topic ideas related to climate change."

2. Gathering keywords to use in Library searches: When you are starting to research a new topic, it can be difficult to come up with search terms that are likely to appear in the sources you want to find. You can ask a chatbot for a list of keywords on specific topics and use those keywords in your searches in OneSearch or other library databases. 

Prompt example: "Give me a list of keywords related to innovation in biomedicine."

3. Suggesting synonyms for keywords: In addition to providing you with a strong set of keywords to begin your searching, chatbots can also act as a thesaurus and provide you with several synonyms to those keywords. Try asking a chatbot for a list of synonyms or similar concepts for select keywords you've identified as best for your research.

Prompt example: "Suggest 10 synonyms relevant to engineering that I can use for the following words: manufacture; properties; debris; bricks." 

4. Summarizing text: You can use chatbots like ChatGPT to summarize readings for you by pasting in the text and asking for a summary. You can give additional prompts to refine the summary, such as asking the chatbot to assume a certain level of knowledge on the part of the reader and to limit the summary to a certain amount of sentences. Keep in mind, most chatbots have a word limit that will determine how much text you can paste in at one time. Use summaries like you would an author-generated abstract to help you determine whether the content meets your research needs, but remember that a summary or abstract is not a substitute for reading the actual text.

Prompt example: "Summarize this text in five sentences or less. Summarize it for me as if I am a first year undergraduate student."

Sources: Choice and Brown University

How do I evaluate information from a Gen-AI tool?

As we've noted, the output of Gen-AI can be filled with inaccuracies, bias, and outright fabrications, so it is important to fact check the results. Lateral reading is a strategy used by professional fact checkers where you open up multiple new tabs and windows on your browser to verify information using outside sources. This is a useful strategy for evaluating any kind of online information.

When evaluating information created by a Gen-AI tool, it is important to take several additional steps. This is because LLMs may be drawing from factual and false source materials indiscriminately, and also because LLMs are responding to specific prompts, and those prompts may also contain misinformation or assumptions.

Watch the video below to see an example of lateral reading to fact check the output of ChatGPT.

Fact-checking is only half of the story. If you want to get the most out of generative AI tools, you'll also need to become adept at asking the "right" questions in the "right" manner. Prompt engineering -- the deliberate crafting and optimization of questions/requests given to AI models to elicit desired outputs -- is increasingly recognized as a crucial skill for maximizing the effectiveness of AI like ChatGPT.

So what are the best ways to craft your prompts? 

1. Be as specific as possible in your request. ChatGPT can't read your mind. If its outputs are too long, ask for brief replies. If outputs are too simple, ask for expert-level writing. The less the AI has to guess at what you want, the more likely you’ll get it.
2. One way to be specific is to give the AI a "persona" in your request and roleplay with it. For example, "You are an expert career advisor and I am a STEM student trying to pick a college major..." 
3. Tell the AI what your goal is so it can help tailor the response. 
4. Provide examples and ask for additional suggestions. Giving the tool a framework can improve its answers. 
5. Provide one side of a debate and ask the tool to provide other perspectives. 

Further reading: Prompt engineering (OpenAI)

Sources: OpenAI and Pace University

In the video below [11:41], AI experts discuss how to effectively prompt AI like Midjourney, ChatGPT, and Microsoft’s Bing (now Copilot), as well as how to take the lead, weaving your own expertise into the interaction.

Some instructors might use tools that claim to be able to detect whether a text was written by generative AI. However, those tools are "neither accurate nor reliable." They give both false negatives and false positives. Additionally, AI detectors have been found to be more likely to label text written by non-native English speakers as AI-written. 

If you are falsely accused of cheating with generative AI*, please refer to the following article and video, which give helpful recommendations for disproving those allegations:

• Article: What students can do if they're falsely accused of using AI to cheat (Washington Post)
• Video: What to do if you are falsely accused of cheating with AI (Dr. Lyndon Walker)

*Please note: these recommendations assume that you have used AI within the guidelines provided by your instructor. Using AI in a manner explicitly prohibited by your instructor will, most likely, negate these recommendations. 

This page is adapted from Using AI Tools for College at Los Angeles Valley Community College