How AI can put mistakes into overdrive
A new study of more than 750 strategy consultants showed that AI helped them produce better content, more quickly in many tasks—but the consultants were "less likely to produce correct solutions" by attempting tasks of similar difficulty which fell outside the AI model's capabilities.Of the consultants asked to develop new ideas—a challenge within GPT-4's known capabilities—those who received both AI access and guidance "consistently" performed better than those given AI access only. Both groups outperformed the control group. Those with AI access also worked faster and completed more of the 18 tasks, on average. Consultants who scored below average in the assessment task got the biggest boost from using AI later in the creativity experiment: Their output improved by 43%, compared to 17% for above average consultants. The other half of the group were tackling one company's deep problems, a topic that GPT-4 knew little about. Those using AI in their responses were "more likely to make mistakes" and 19% less likely to produce correct solutions compared to those without AI.
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