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E79: AI Makes you Smarter but not Wiser: How AI affects your Cognition
Description
Does using AI make us smarter, or just more confident?This ep covers a recent study on how generative AI affects our "metacognition" - our ability to judge our own performance. Researchers tracked hundreds of people solving logical reasoning problems with and without AI.They found: a) AI improved scores, but people overestimated their results even more, b) people who knew more about AI were less accurate judging their own work, c) the Dunning-Kruger effect disappeared, where everybody becomes equally overconfidentRef: “AI Makes You Smarter, But None the Wiser: The Disconnect between Performance and Metacognition” (Fernandes et al., 2026).
More research at SafetyInsights.Org
Intro/Output "Dark Synth Wave" by ElephantGreen (PixaBay.com)
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