how to write essays with chat gpt

• PRO Courses Guides New Tech Help Pro Expert Videos About wikiHow Pro Upgrade Sign In
• EDIT Edit this Article
• EXPLORE Tech Help Pro About Us Random Article Quizzes Request a New Article Community Dashboard This Or That Game Popular Categories Arts and Entertainment Artwork Books Movies Computers and Electronics Computers Phone Skills Technology Hacks Health Men's Health Mental Health Women's Health Relationships Dating Love Relationship Issues Hobbies and Crafts Crafts Drawing Games Education & Communication Communication Skills Personal Development Studying Personal Care and Style Fashion Hair Care Personal Hygiene Youth Personal Care School Stuff Dating All Categories Arts and Entertainment Finance and Business Home and Garden Relationship Quizzes Cars & Other Vehicles Food and Entertaining Personal Care and Style Sports and Fitness Computers and Electronics Health Pets and Animals Travel Education & Communication Hobbies and Crafts Philosophy and Religion Work World Family Life Holidays and Traditions Relationships Youth
• Browse Articles
• Learn Something New
• Quizzes Hot
• This Or That Game
• Train Your Brain
• Explore More
• Support wikiHow
• About wikiHow
• Log in / Sign up
• Computers and Electronics
• Online Communications

How to Get ChatGPT to Write an Essay: Prompts, Outlines, & More

Last Updated: June 2, 2024 Fact Checked

Getting ChatGPT to Write the Essay

Using ai to help you write, expert interview.

This article was written by Bryce Warwick, JD and by wikiHow staff writer, Nicole Levine, MFA . Bryce Warwick is currently the President of Warwick Strategies, an organization based in the San Francisco Bay Area offering premium, personalized private tutoring for the GMAT, LSAT and GRE. Bryce has a JD from the George Washington University Law School. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 49,392 times.

Are you curious about using ChatGPT to write an essay? While most instructors have tools that make it easy to detect AI-written essays, there are ways you can use OpenAI's ChatGPT to write papers without worrying about plagiarism or getting caught. In addition to writing essays for you, ChatGPT can also help you come up with topics, write outlines, find sources, check your grammar, and even format your citations. This wikiHow article will teach you the best ways to use ChatGPT to write essays, including helpful example prompts that will generate impressive papers.

Things You Should Know

• To have ChatGPT write an essay, tell it your topic, word count, type of essay, and facts or viewpoints to include.
• ChatGPT is also useful for generating essay topics, writing outlines, and checking grammar.
• Because ChatGPT can make mistakes and trigger AI-detection alarms, it's better to use AI to assist with writing than have it do the writing.

• Before using the OpenAI's ChatGPT to write your essay, make sure you understand your instructor's policies on AI tools. Using ChatGPT may be against the rules, and it's easy for instructors to detect AI-written essays.
• While you can use ChatGPT to write a polished-looking essay, there are drawbacks. Most importantly, ChatGPT cannot verify facts or provide references. This means that essays created by ChatGPT may contain made-up facts and biased content. [1] X Research source It's best to use ChatGPT for inspiration and examples instead of having it write the essay for you.

• The topic you want to write about.
• Essay length, such as word or page count. Whether you're writing an essay for a class, college application, or even a cover letter , you'll want to tell ChatGPT how much to write.
• Other assignment details, such as type of essay (e.g., personal, book report, etc.) and points to mention.
• If you're writing an argumentative or persuasive essay , know the stance you want to take so ChatGPT can argue your point.
• If you have notes on the topic that you want to include, you can also provide those to ChatGPT.
• When you plan an essay, think of a thesis, a topic sentence, a body paragraph, and the examples you expect to present in each paragraph.
• It can be like an outline and not an extensive sentence-by-sentence structure. It should be a good overview of how the points relate.

• "Write a 2000-word college essay that covers different approaches to gun violence prevention in the United States. Include facts about gun laws and give ideas on how to improve them."
• This prompt not only tells ChatGPT the topic, length, and grade level, but also that the essay is personal. ChatGPT will write the essay in the first-person point of view.
• "Write a 4-page college application essay about an obstacle I have overcome. I am applying to the Geography program and want to be a cartographer. The obstacle is that I have dyslexia. Explain that I have always loved maps, and that having dyslexia makes me better at making them."

Tyrone Showers

Be specific when using ChatGPT. Clear and concise prompts outlining your exact needs help ChatGPT tailor its response. Specify the desired outcome (e.g., creative writing, informative summary, functional resume), any length constraints (word or character count), and the preferred emotional tone (formal, humorous, etc.)

• In our essay about gun control, ChatGPT did not mention school shootings. If we want to discuss this topic in the essay, we can use the prompt, "Discuss school shootings in the essay."
• Let's say we review our college entrance essay and realize that we forgot to mention that we grew up without parents. Add to the essay by saying, "Mention that my parents died when I was young."
• In the Israel-Palestine essay, ChatGPT explored two options for peace: A 2-state solution and a bi-state solution. If you'd rather the essay focus on a single option, ask ChatGPT to remove one. For example, "Change my essay so that it focuses on a bi-state solution."

Pay close attention to the content ChatGPT generates. If you use ChatGPT often, you'll start noticing its patterns, like its tendency to begin articles with phrases like "in today's digital world." Once you spot patterns, you can refine your prompts to steer ChatGPT in a better direction and avoid repetitive content.

• "Give me ideas for an essay about the Israel-Palestine conflict."
• "Ideas for a persuasive essay about a current event."
• "Give me a list of argumentative essay topics about COVID-19 for a Political Science 101 class."

• "Create an outline for an argumentative essay called "The Impact of COVID-19 on the Economy."
• "Write an outline for an essay about positive uses of AI chatbots in schools."
• "Create an outline for a short 2-page essay on disinformation in the 2016 election."

• "Find peer-reviewed sources for advances in using MRNA vaccines for cancer."
• "Give me a list of sources from academic journals about Black feminism in the movie Black Panther."
• "Give me sources for an essay on current efforts to ban children's books in US libraries."

• "Write a 4-page college paper about how global warming is changing the automotive industry in the United States."
• "Write a 750-word personal college entrance essay about how my experience with homelessness as a child has made me more resilient."
• You can even refer to the outline you created with ChatGPT, as the AI bot can reference up to 3000 words from the current conversation. For example: "Write a 1000 word argumentative essay called 'The Impact of COVID-19 on the United States Economy' using the outline you provided. Argue that the government should take more action to support businesses affected by the pandemic."

• One way to do this is to paste a list of the sources you've used, including URLs, book titles, authors, pages, publishers, and other details, into ChatGPT along with the instruction "Create an MLA Works Cited page for these sources."
• You can also ask ChatGPT to provide a list of sources, and then build a Works Cited or References page that includes those sources. You can then replace sources you didn't use with the sources you did use.

Expert Q&A

• Because it's easy for teachers, hiring managers, and college admissions offices to spot AI-written essays, it's best to use your ChatGPT-written essay as a guide to write your own essay. Using the structure and ideas from ChatGPT, write an essay in the same format, but using your own words. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• Always double-check the facts in your essay, and make sure facts are backed up with legitimate sources. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• If you see an error that says ChatGPT is at capacity , wait a few moments and try again. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

• Using ChatGPT to write or assist with your essay may be against your instructor's rules. Make sure you understand the consequences of using ChatGPT to write or assist with your essay. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0
• ChatGPT-written essays may include factual inaccuracies, outdated information, and inadequate detail. [3] X Research source Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

You Might Also Like

Thanks for reading our article! If you’d like to learn more about completing school assignments, check out our in-depth interview with Bryce Warwick, JD .

• ↑ https://help.openai.com/en/articles/6783457-what-is-chatgpt
• ↑ https://platform.openai.com/examples/default-essay-outline
• ↑ https://www.ipl.org/div/chatgpt/

About This Article

• Send fan mail to authors

Is this article up to date?

Featured Articles

Trending Articles

Watch Articles

• Terms of Use
• Privacy Policy
• Do Not Sell or Share My Info
• Not Selling Info

wikiHow Tech Help Pro:

Level up your tech skills and stay ahead of the curve

Navigation Menu

Search code, repositories, users, issues, pull requests..., provide feedback.

We read every piece of feedback, and take your input very seriously.

Saved searches

Use saved searches to filter your results more quickly.

To see all available qualifiers, see our documentation .

• Notifications You must be signed in to change notification settings

This list of writing prompts covers a range of topics and tasks, including brainstorming research ideas, improving language and style, conducting literature reviews, and developing research plans.

ahmetbersoz/chatgpt-prompts-for-academic-writing

Folders and files.

Repository files navigation

✨ NEW UPDATE: Literature Review Generator

A Custom GPT for Literature Review Generator has been released. It efficiently parses PDF files of research publications, extracts key themes, and creates a literature review section for your academic publications.

TRY NOW: https://chat.openai.com/g/g-G3U8pZGwC-literature-review-generator

ChatGPT Prompts for Academic Writing

In this repository, this list of writing prompts covers a range of topics and tasks, including brainstorming research ideas, improving language and style, conducting literature reviews, and developing research plans. Whether you're a student, researcher, or academic professional, these prompts can help you hone your writing abilities and tackle your writing projects with confidence.

Use directly in: chat.openai.com

The list is regularly updated, so you can keep track of new prompts by following this repository.

TIPS: As there is a limit to the number of words that can be used in ChatGPT, you can input your text multiple times using the prompt "Read this [PARAPGRAPH]:" and then run your final prompt "Considering the above text...".

You can also use prompts splitter: chatgpt-prompt-splitter.jjdiaz.dev

BRAINSTORMING

Article sections, title/topic sentence, introduction, literature review.

NOTE: Be careful and double-check article existence. ChatGPT may generate fake references

Methodology

Experiments, future works, improving language, summarization, plan/presentation, working with documents (available only in gpt-4).

Upload a PDF file of a paper then:

Upload a PDF file of your paper then:

Upload PDF files of papers then:

Upload a figure image then:

Contributors 4

• Helldivers 2
• Dragon’s Dogma 2
• Wuthering Waves
• Genshin Impact
• Counter Strike 2
• Honkai Star Rail
• Lego Fortnite
• Stardew Valley
• NYT Strands
• NYT Connections
• Apple Watch
• Crunchyroll
• Prime Video
• Jujutsu Kaisen
• Demon Slayer
• Chainsaw Man
• Solo Leveling
• Beebom Gadgets

How to Use ChatGPT to Write Essays That Impress

Step 1: Use ChatGPT to Find and Refine Essay Topics

• Log into the service and type the following prompt into ChatGPT:

• As you can see, ChatGPT gave several good ideas for our essay. If you want to refine the idea further, you can ask the chatbot to cut out some parts of the idea and replace them. Or, you can ask for more context in certain parts. Example – “Expand more on topic number 5 and what it means.”

Step 2: Ask ChatGPT to Construct an Outline

• With the same chat open, type out “ Give me an essay outline for <selected topic>. Make sure to keep it structured as I’ll use it to write my essay .” In this case, I will use topic number 2 since it aligns with what I had in mind.

• As you can see above, we now have a structured outline for our essay. We can use this to write our essay or have ChatGPT do that job. Nonetheless, it’s a good starting point. As always, you can have the AI chatbot cut out parts of the outline or specifically add new ones depending on your requirement.

Step 3: Get ChatGPT to Cite Sources for Your Essay

Even though we have the idea and the outline, we will need to do our research for proof supporting our essay. Thankfully, ChatGPT can be of some help here. Since the chatbot is adept at moderate research, users can get a general idea of where to look for gathering information. Let’s begin doing that.

• Let’s begin asking ChatGPT for sources. With the same chat open, type in the following prompt:

• Now we have a list of 10 sources we can reference from. However, you can also see that ChatGPT mentions the year 2021 in some of them. Therefore, it’s best to use these websites but navigate to the latest pages pertaining to your essay for research. This applies to every topic, so always do it. Also, chatbots like ChatGPT have a habit of hallucinating and making up information, so do be careful.

Step 4: Have ChatGPT Write the Essay

• In the same chat, type the following prompt – “With the topic and outline available to you, generate a 700-word essay. Make sure to keep it structured and concise yet informational. Also, keep in mind my target audience is <Insert target audience> so cater to that accordingly.”
• In the middle of the essay, ChatGPT might stop and not answer. Simply type “ Continue ,” and it will finish the rest of the essay.

Step 5: Edit the Essay with ChatGPT

No matter if you have used ChatGPT to draft a complete essay or have written one yourself, you can use this step to make ChatGPT your co-editor and grammar checker. While your essay might need an initial look from a human, you can definitely use the bot to hash out the tone and add little details.

• Either open up the same chat or have your essay already in the clipboard. With that done, type out the following prompt:

Step 6: Export the Essay for Submission

However, for those who want to export the essay into a more aesthetic format, we have just the thing for you. There is no shortage of best ChatGPT Chrome extensions on the internet right now. We have one such selection linked in our list that can export selective chats onto beautiful image formats if you want to show off your essay. Check it out and let us know how you liked it.

Bonus: ChatGPT and AI Apps to Write Essays

1. writesonic.

Ryter is another helpful AI writing assistant that not only helps with essays but all types of articles. The service is powered by a language model that gives it intelligence. Rytr comes with 40+ different use cases and 20+ writing tones for all types of written material. For those who don’t want to stick to English, it even comes with support for 30+ languages.

Upanishad Sharma

Combining his love for Literature and Tech, Upanishad dived into the world of technology journalism with fire. Now he writes about anything and everything while keeping a keen eye on his first love of gaming. Often found chronically walking around the office.

Im student i want to become financially independent woman in life so I want esay essay write

I am housewife and I want easy essay I want to change my life my husband was job less and I want to work online part time job plz help I am enter pass

Add new comment

How to use ChatGPT for writing

AI can make you a better writer, if you know how to get the best from it

Summarizing other works

Worldbuilding, creating outlines, building characters, how to improve your chatgpt responses.

ChatGPT has taken the world by storm in a very short period of time, as users continue to test the boundaries of what the AI chatbot can accomplish. And so far, that's a lot. 

Some of it is negative, of course: for instance Samsung workers accidentally leaking top-secret data while using ChatGPT , or the AI chatbot being used for malware scams . Plagiarism is also rampant, with the use of ChatGPT for writing college essays a potential problem.

However, while ChatGPT can and has been used for wrongdoing, to the point where the Future of Life Institution released an open letter calling for the temporary halt of OpenAI system work , AI isn’t all bad. Far from it.

For a start, anyone who writes something may well have used AI to enhance their work already. The most common applications, of course, are the grammar and spelling correction tools found in everything from email applications to word processors. But there are a growing number of other examples of how AI can be used for writing. So, how do you bridge the gap between using AI as the tool it is, without crossing over into plagiarism city?

In fact, there are many ways ChatGPT can be used to enhance your skills, particularly when it comes to researching, developing, and organizing ideas and information for creative writing. By using AI as it was intended - as a tool, not a crutch - it can enrich your writing in ways that help to better your craft, without resorting to it doing everything for you. 

Below, we've listed some of our favorite ways to use ChatGPT and similar AI chatbots for writing. 

A key part of any writing task is the research, and thanks to the internet that chore has never been easier to accomplish. However, while finding the general sources you need is far less time-consuming than it once was, actually parsing all that information is still the same slog it’s always been. But this is where ChatGPT comes in. You can use the AI bot to do the manual labor for you and then reap the benefits of having tons of data to use for your work.

Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your inbox

Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more.

The steps are slightly different, depending on whether you want an article or book summarized . 

For the article, there are two ways to have ChatGPT summarize it. The first requires you to type in the words ‘TLDR:’ and then paste the article’s URL next to it. The second method is a bit more tedious, but increases the accuracy of your summary. For that, you’ll need to copy and paste the article itself into the prompt . 

Summarizing a book is much easier, as long as it was published before 2021. Simply type into the prompt ‘summarize [book title]’ and it should do the rest for you.

This should go without saying, but for any articles or books, make sure you read the source material first before using any information presented to you. While ChatGPT is an incredibly useful tool that can create resources meant for future reference, it’s not a perfect one and is subject to accidentally inserting misinformation into anything it gives you.

One of the most extensive and important tasks when crafting your creative work is to properly flesh out the world your characters occupy. Even for works set in a regular modern setting, it can take plenty of effort to research the various cultures, landmarks, languages, and neighborhoods your characters live in and encounter. 

Now, imagine stories that require their own unique setting, and how much more work that entails in terms of creating those same details from scratch. While it’s vital that the main ideas come from you, using ChatGPT can be a great way to streamline the process, especially with more tedious details.

For instance, if you need certain fictional words without wanting to create an entirely fictional language, you can prompt ChatGPT with the following : “Create a language including an alphabet, phonetics, grammar, and the most common 100 words. Base it on [insert real-life languages here]” and it will give you some good starting points. However, it’s imperative that you take these words and look them up, to ensure you aren’t appropriating sensitive terms or using offensive real-life words.

Another example is useful for those who write scenarios for games, especially tabletop games such as Dungeons & Dragons or Call of Cthulhu . Dungeon Masters (who run the games) may often need to create documents or other fake materials for their world, but doing so takes a lot of time and effort. Now, they can prompt ChatGPT to quickly create filler text that sounds interesting or authentic but is inherently useless; it's essentially like ' Lorem Ipsum ' text, but more immersive.

When writing a story, many people will use an outline to ensure they stay on track and that the narrative flows well. But actually sitting down and organizing everything in your head in order to create a cohesive reference is a lot more daunting than it seems. It’s one of those steps that can be crucial to a well-structured work of fiction, but it can also become a hurdle. This is another area where ChatGPT can come in handy.

The key to writing an effective outline is remembering that you don’t need to have all the answers first. It’s there to structure your content, by helping you hit critical points and not miss important details in the process. While there are AI generators with a more specific focus on this topic, ChatGPT will do a good job at taking a general prompt and returning points for you to keep in mind while you research and write around that topic.

For instance, I prompted ChatGPT with “I want to write a story about a black woman in 16th century England” and it gave me a well-thought-out series of steps to help me create a story that would reflect my topic. An outline such as this would be particularly useful for those needing a resource they can quickly turn to for inspiration when writing. After that, you can begin to develop more complex ideas and have the AI organize those specifics into much easier-to-follow steps.

What makes any great story are the characters that inhabit it. Writing strong, fleshed-out characters is the cornerstone of any creative work and, naturally, the process of creating such a character can be difficult. Their background, manner of speech, goals, dreams, look, and more must be carefully considered and planned out. And this is another aspect of writing that ChatGPT can aid with, if you know how to go about it.

A basic way to use ChatGPT in this regard is to have it generate possible characters that could populate whatever setting you’re writing for. For example, I prompted it with “Provide some ideas for characters set in 1920s Harlem” and it gave me a full list of people with varied and distinctive backstories to use as a jumping-off point. Each character is described with a single sentence, enough to help start the process of creating them, but still leaving the crux of developing them up to me.

One of the most interesting features of ChatGPT is that you can flat-out roleplay with a character, whether they're a historical figure or one that you created but need help fleshing out. Take that same character you just created and have a conversation with them by asking them questions on their history, family life, profession, etc. Based on my previous results, I prompted with “Pretend to be a jazz musician from 1920s Harlem. Let's have a conversation.” I then asked questions from there, basing them on prior answers. Of course, from there you need to parse through these responses to filter out unnecessary or inaccurate details, while fleshing out what works for your story, but it does provide you with a useful stepping stone.

If you’re having issues getting the results you want, the problem could be with how you’re phrasing those questions or prompts in the first place. We've got a full guide to how to improve your ChatGPT prompts and responses , but here are a few of the best options:

• Specify the direction you want the AI to go, by adding in relevant details 
• Prompt from a specific role to guide the responses in the proper direction
• Make sure your prompts are free of typos and grammatical errors
• Keep your tone conversational, as that’s how ChatGPT was built
• Learn from yours and its mistakes to make it a better tool
• Break up your conversations into 500 words or less, as that’s when the AI begins to break down and go off topic
• If you need something clarified, ask the AI based on its last response
• Ask it to cite sources and then check those sources
• Sometimes it’s best to start fresh with a brand new conversation

Of course, many of the above suggestions apply not just to ChatGPT but also to the other chatbots springing up in its wake. Check out our list of the best ChatGPT alternatives and see which one works best for you.

• Link to facebook
• Link to linkedin
• Link to twitter
• Link to youtube
• Writing Tips

How to Write Your Essay Using ChatGPT

• 5-minute read
• 2nd May 2023

It’s tempting, isn’t it? You’ve read about and probably also witnessed how quickly ChatGPT can knock up text, seemingly in any genre or style and of any length, in less time than it takes you to make a cup of tea. However, getting ChatGPT to write your essay for you would be plagiarism . Universities and colleges are alive to the issue, and you may face serious academic penalties if you’re found to have used AI in that way.

So that’s that, right? Not necessarily.

This post is not about how to get ChatGPT to write your essay . It’s about how you can use the tool to help yourself write an essay .

What Is ChatGPT?

Let’s start with the basics. ChatGPT is one of several chatbots that can answer questions in a conversational style, as if the answer were coming from a human. It provides answers based on information it receives in development and in response to prompts you provide.

In that respect, like a human, ChatGPT is limited by the information it has. Where it lacks the information, it has a tendency to fill the gaps regardless . This action is dangerous if you’re relying on the accuracy of the information, and it’s another good reason you should not get ChatGPT to write your essay for you.

How Can You Use ChatGPT to Help With Your Essay?

Forget about the much talked-about writing skills of ChatGPT – writing is your thing here. Instead, think of ChatGPT as your assistant. Here are some ideas for how you can make it work for you.

Essay Prompts

If your task is to come up with your own essay topic but you find yourself staring at a blank page, you can use ChatGPT for inspiration. Your prompt could look something like this:

ChatGPT can offer several ideas. The choice of which one to write about (and you may, of course, still come up with one of your own) will be up to you, based on what interests you and the topic’s potential for in-depth analysis.

Essay Outlines

Having decided on your essay topic – or perhaps you’ve already been given one by your instructor – you may be struggling to figure out how to structure the essay. You can use ChatGPT to suggest an outline. Your prompt can be along these lines:

Just as you should not use ChatGPT to write an essay for you, you should not use it to research one – that’s your job.

If, however, you’re struggling to understand a particular extract, you can ask ChatGPT to summarize it or explain it in simpler terms.

Find this useful?

Subscribe to our newsletter and get writing tips from our editors straight to your inbox.

That said, you can’t rely on ChatGPT to be factually accurate in the information it provides, even when you think the information would be in its database, as we discovered in another post. Indeed, when we asked ChatGPT whether we should fact-check its information, the response was:

An appropriate use of ChatGPT for research would be to ask for academic resources for further reading on a particular topic. The advantage of doing this is that, in going on to locate and read the suggested resources, you will have checked that they exist and that the content is relevant and accurately set out in your essay.

Instead of researching the topic as a whole, you could use ChatGPT to generate suggestions for the occasional snippet of information, like this:

Before deciding which of its suggestions – if any – to include, you should ask ChatGPT for the source of the fact or statistic so you can check it and provide the necessary citation.

Referencing

Even reading the word above has probably made you groan. As if writing the essay isn’t hard enough, you then have to not only list all the sources you used, but also make sure that you’ve formatted them in a particular style. Here’s where you can use ChatGPT. We have a separate post dealing specifically with this topic, but in brief, you can ask something like this:

Where information is missing, as in the example above, ChatGPT will likely fill in the gaps. In such cases, you’ll have to ensure that the information it fills in is correct.

Proofreading

After finishing the writing and referencing, you’d be well advised to proofread your work, but you’re not always the best person to do so – you’d be tired and would likely read only what you expect to see. At least as a first step, you can copy and paste your essay into ChatGPT and ask it something like this:

You’ve got the message that you can’t just ask ChatGPT to write your essay, right? But in some areas, ChatGPT can help you write your essay, providing, as with any tool, you use it carefully and are alert to the risks.

We should point out that universities and colleges have different attitudes toward using AI – including whether you need to cite its use in your reference list – so always check what’s acceptable.

After using ChatGPT to help with your work, you can always ask our experts to look over it to check your references and/or improve your grammar, spelling, and tone. We’re available 24/7, and you can even try our services for free .

Share this article:

Post A New Comment

Got content that needs a quick turnaround? Let us polish your work. Explore our editorial business services.

9-minute read

How to Use Infographics to Boost Your Presentation

Is your content getting noticed? Capturing and maintaining an audience’s attention is a challenge when...

8-minute read

Why Interactive PDFs Are Better for Engagement

Are you looking to enhance engagement and captivate your audience through your professional documents? Interactive...

7-minute read

Seven Key Strategies for Voice Search Optimization

Voice search optimization is rapidly shaping the digital landscape, requiring content professionals to adapt their...

4-minute read

Five Creative Ways to Showcase Your Digital Portfolio

Are you a creative freelancer looking to make a lasting impression on potential clients or...

How to Ace Slack Messaging for Contractors and Freelancers

Effective professional communication is an important skill for contractors and freelancers navigating remote work environments....

3-minute read

How to Insert a Text Box in a Google Doc

Google Docs is a powerful collaborative tool, and mastering its features can significantly enhance your...

Make sure your writing is the best it can be with our expert English proofreading and editing.

Celebrating 150 years of Harvard Summer School. Learn about our history.

Should I Use ChatGPT to Write My Essays?

Everything high school and college students need to know about using — and not using — ChatGPT for writing essays.

Jessica A. Kent

ChatGPT is one of the most buzzworthy technologies today.

In addition to other generative artificial intelligence (AI) models, it is expected to change the world. In academia, students and professors are preparing for the ways that ChatGPT will shape education, and especially how it will impact a fundamental element of any course: the academic essay.

Students can use ChatGPT to generate full essays based on a few simple prompts. But can AI actually produce high quality work, or is the technology just not there yet to deliver on its promise? Students may also be asking themselves if they should use AI to write their essays for them and what they might be losing out on if they did.

AI is here to stay, and it can either be a help or a hindrance depending on how you use it. Read on to become better informed about what ChatGPT can and can’t do, how to use it responsibly to support your academic assignments, and the benefits of writing your own essays.

What is Generative AI?

Artificial intelligence isn’t a twenty-first century invention. Beginning in the 1950s, data scientists started programming computers to solve problems and understand spoken language. AI’s capabilities grew as computer speeds increased and today we use AI for data analysis, finding patterns, and providing insights on the data it collects.

But why the sudden popularity in recent applications like ChatGPT? This new generation of AI goes further than just data analysis. Instead, generative AI creates new content. It does this by analyzing large amounts of data — GPT-3 was trained on 45 terabytes of data, or a quarter of the Library of Congress — and then generating new content based on the patterns it sees in the original data.

It’s like the predictive text feature on your phone; as you start typing a new message, predictive text makes suggestions of what should come next based on data from past conversations. Similarly, ChatGPT creates new text based on past data. With the right prompts, ChatGPT can write marketing content, code, business forecasts, and even entire academic essays on any subject within seconds.

But is generative AI as revolutionary as people think it is, or is it lacking in real intelligence?

The Drawbacks of Generative AI

It seems simple. You’ve been assigned an essay to write for class. You go to ChatGPT and ask it to write a five-paragraph academic essay on the topic you’ve been assigned. You wait a few seconds and it generates the essay for you!

But ChatGPT is still in its early stages of development, and that essay is likely not as accurate or well-written as you’d expect it to be. Be aware of the drawbacks of having ChatGPT complete your assignments.

It’s not intelligence, it’s statistics

One of the misconceptions about AI is that it has a degree of human intelligence. However, its intelligence is actually statistical analysis, as it can only generate “original” content based on the patterns it sees in already existing data and work.

It “hallucinates”

Generative AI models often provide false information — so much so that there’s a term for it: “AI hallucination.” OpenAI even has a warning on its home screen , saying that “ChatGPT may produce inaccurate information about people, places, or facts.” This may be due to gaps in its data, or because it lacks the ability to verify what it’s generating. 

It doesn’t do research  

If you ask ChatGPT to find and cite sources for you, it will do so, but they could be inaccurate or even made up.

This is because AI doesn’t know how to look for relevant research that can be applied to your thesis. Instead, it generates content based on past content, so if a number of papers cite certain sources, it will generate new content that sounds like it’s a credible source — except it likely may not be.

There are data privacy concerns

When you input your data into a public generative AI model like ChatGPT, where does that data go and who has access to it? 

Prompting ChatGPT with original research should be a cause for concern — especially if you’re inputting study participants’ personal information into the third-party, public application. 

JPMorgan has restricted use of ChatGPT due to privacy concerns, Italy temporarily blocked ChatGPT in March 2023 after a data breach, and Security Intelligence advises that “if [a user’s] notes include sensitive data … it enters the chatbot library. The user no longer has control over the information.”

It is important to be aware of these issues and take steps to ensure that you’re using the technology responsibly and ethically. 

It skirts the plagiarism issue

AI creates content by drawing on a large library of information that’s already been created, but is it plagiarizing? Could there be instances where ChatGPT “borrows” from previous work and places it into your work without citing it? Schools and universities today are wrestling with this question of what’s plagiarism and what’s not when it comes to AI-generated work.

To demonstrate this, one Elon University professor gave his class an assignment: Ask ChatGPT to write an essay for you, and then grade it yourself. 

“Many students expressed shock and dismay upon learning the AI could fabricate bogus information,” he writes, adding that he expected some essays to contain errors, but all of them did. 

His students were disappointed that “major tech companies had pushed out AI technology without ensuring that the general population understands its drawbacks” and were concerned about how many embraced such a flawed tool.

Explore Our High School Programs

How to Use AI as a Tool to Support Your Work

As more students are discovering, generative AI models like ChatGPT just aren’t as advanced or intelligent as they may believe. While AI may be a poor option for writing your essay, it can be a great tool to support your work.

Generate ideas for essays

Have ChatGPT help you come up with ideas for essays. For example, input specific prompts, such as, “Please give me five ideas for essays I can write on topics related to WWII,” or “Please give me five ideas for essays I can write comparing characters in twentieth century novels.” Then, use what it provides as a starting point for your original research.

Generate outlines

You can also use ChatGPT to help you create an outline for an essay. Ask it, “Can you create an outline for a five paragraph essay based on the following topic” and it will create an outline with an introduction, body paragraphs, conclusion, and a suggested thesis statement. Then, you can expand upon the outline with your own research and original thought.

Generate titles for your essays

Titles should draw a reader into your essay, yet they’re often hard to get right. Have ChatGPT help you by prompting it with, “Can you suggest five titles that would be good for a college essay about [topic]?”

The Benefits of Writing Your Essays Yourself

Asking a robot to write your essays for you may seem like an easy way to get ahead in your studies or save some time on assignments. But, outsourcing your work to ChatGPT can negatively impact not just your grades, but your ability to communicate and think critically as well. It’s always the best approach to write your essays yourself.

Create your own ideas

Writing an essay yourself means that you’re developing your own thoughts, opinions, and questions about the subject matter, then testing, proving, and defending those thoughts. 

When you complete school and start your career, projects aren’t simply about getting a good grade or checking a box, but can instead affect the company you’re working for — or even impact society. Being able to think for yourself is necessary to create change and not just cross work off your to-do list.

Building a foundation of original thinking and ideas now will help you carve your unique career path in the future.

Develop your critical thinking and analysis skills

In order to test or examine your opinions or questions about a subject matter, you need to analyze a problem or text, and then use your critical thinking skills to determine the argument you want to make to support your thesis. Critical thinking and analysis skills aren’t just necessary in school — they’re skills you’ll apply throughout your career and your life.

Improve your research skills

Writing your own essays will train you in how to conduct research, including where to find sources, how to determine if they’re credible, and their relevance in supporting or refuting your argument. Knowing how to do research is another key skill required throughout a wide variety of professional fields.

Learn to be a great communicator

Writing an essay involves communicating an idea clearly to your audience, structuring an argument that a reader can follow, and making a conclusion that challenges them to think differently about a subject. Effective and clear communication is necessary in every industry.

Be impacted by what you’re learning about : 

Engaging with the topic, conducting your own research, and developing original arguments allows you to really learn about a subject you may not have encountered before. Maybe a simple essay assignment around a work of literature, historical time period, or scientific study will spark a passion that can lead you to a new major or career.

Resources to Improve Your Essay Writing Skills

While there are many rewards to writing your essays yourself, the act of writing an essay can still be challenging, and the process may come easier for some students than others. But essay writing is a skill that you can hone, and students at Harvard Summer School have access to a number of on-campus and online resources to assist them.

Students can start with the Harvard Summer School Writing Center , where writing tutors can offer you help and guidance on any writing assignment in one-on-one meetings. Tutors can help you strengthen your argument, clarify your ideas, improve the essay’s structure, and lead you through revisions. 

The Harvard libraries are a great place to conduct your research, and its librarians can help you define your essay topic, plan and execute a research strategy, and locate sources. 

Finally, review the “ The Harvard Guide to Using Sources ,” which can guide you on what to cite in your essay and how to do it. Be sure to review the “Tips For Avoiding Plagiarism” on the “ Resources to Support Academic Integrity ” webpage as well to help ensure your success.

Sign up to our mailing list to learn more about Harvard Summer School

The Future of AI in the Classroom

ChatGPT and other generative AI models are here to stay, so it’s worthwhile to learn how you can leverage the technology responsibly and wisely so that it can be a tool to support your academic pursuits. However, nothing can replace the experience and achievement gained from communicating your own ideas and research in your own academic essays.

About the Author

Jessica A. Kent is a freelance writer based in Boston, Mass. and a Harvard Extension School alum. Her digital marketing content has been featured on Fast Company, Forbes, Nasdaq, and other industry websites; her essays and short stories have been featured in North American Review, Emerson Review, Writer’s Bone, and others.

5 Key Qualities of Students Who Succeed at Harvard Summer School (and in College!)

This guide outlines the kinds of students who thrive at Harvard Summer School and what the programs offer in return.

Harvard Division of Continuing Education

The Division of Continuing Education (DCE) at Harvard University is dedicated to bringing rigorous academics and innovative teaching capabilities to those seeking to improve their lives through education. We make Harvard education accessible to lifelong learners from high school to retirement.

To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories .

• The Big Story
• Newsletters
• Steven Levy's Plaintext Column
• WIRED Classics from the Archive
• WIRED Insider
• WIRED Consulting

5 Ways ChatGPT Can Improve, Not Replace, Your Writing

It's been quite a year for ChatGPT, with the large language model (LLM) now taking exams, churning out content , searching the web, writing code, and more. The AI chatbot can produce its own stories , though whether they're any good is another matter.

If you're in any way involved in the business of writing, then tools like ChatGPT have the potential to complete up-end the way you work—but at this stage, it's not inevitable that journalists, authors, and copywriters will be replaced by generative AI bots.

What we can say with certainty is that ChatGPT is a reliable writing assistant, provided you use it in the right way. If you have to put words in order as part of your job, here's how ChatGPT might be able to take your writing to the next level—at least until it replaces you, anyway.

Using a thesaurus as a writer isn't particularly frowned on; using ChatGPT to come up with the right word or phrase shouldn’t be either. You can use the bot to look for variations on a particular word, or get even more specific and say you want alternatives that are less or more formal, longer or shorter, and so on.

Where ChatGPT really comes in handy is when you're reaching for a word and you're not even sure it exists: Ask about "a word that means a sense of melancholy but in particular one that comes and goes and doesn't seem to have a single cause" and you'll get back "ennui" as a suggestion (or at least we did).

If you have characters talking, you might even ask about words or phrases that would typically be said by someone from a particular region, of a particular age, or with particular character traits. This being ChatGPT, you can always ask for more suggestions.

ChatGPT is never short of ideas.

Whatever you might think about the quality and character of ChatGPT's prose, it's hard to deny that it's quite good at coming up with ideas . If your powers of imagination have hit a wall then you can turn to ChatGPT for some inspiration about plot points, character motivations, the settings of scenes, and so on.

This can be anything from the broad to the detailed. Maybe you need ideas about what to write a novel or an article about—where it's set, what the context is, and what the theme is. If you're a short story writer, perhaps you could challenge yourself to write five tales inspired by ideas from ChatGPT.

Alternatively, you might need inspiration for something very precise, whether that's what happens next in a scene or how to summarize an essay. At whatever point in the process you get writer's block, then ChatGPT might be one way of working through it.

Writing is often about a lot more than putting words down in order. You'll regularly have to look up facts, figures, trends, history, and more to make sure that everything is accurate (unless your next literary work is entirely inside a fantasy world that you're imagining yourself).

ChatGPT can sometimes have the edge over conventional search engines when it comes to knowing what food people might have eaten in a certain year in a certain part of the world, or what the procedure is for a particular type of crime. Whereas Google might give you SEO-packed spam sites with conflicting answers, ChatGPT will actually return something coherent.

That said, we know that LLMs have a tendency to “hallucinate” and present inaccurate information—so you should always double-check what ChatGPT tells you with a second source to make sure you're not getting something wildly wrong.

Getting fictional character and place names right can be a challenge, especially when they're important to the plot. A name has to have the right vibe and the right connotations, and if you get it wrong it really sticks out on the page.

ChatGPT can come up with an unlimited number of names for people and places in your next work of fiction, and it can be a lot of fun playing around with this too. The more detail you give about a person or a place, the better—maybe you want a name that really reflects a character trait for example, or a geographical feature.

The elements of human creation and curation aren't really replaced, because you're still weighing up which names work and which don't, and picking the right one—but getting ChatGPT on the job can save you a lot of brainstorming time.

Get your names right with ChatGPT.

With a bit of cutting and pasting, you can quickly get ChatGPT to review your writing as well: It'll attempt to tell you if there's anything that doesn't make sense, if your sentences are too long, or if your prose is too lengthy.

From spotting spelling and grammar mistakes to recognizing a tone that's too formal, ChatGPT has plenty to offer as an editor and critic. Just remember that this is an LLM, after all, and it doesn't actually “know” anything—try to keep a reasonable balance between accepting ChatGPT's suggestions and giving it too much control.

If you're sharing your work with ChatGPT, you can also ask it for better ways to phrase something, or suggestions on how to change the tone—though this gets into the area of having the bot actually do your writing for you, which all genuine writers would want to avoid.

WIRED has teamed up with Jobbio to create WIRED Hired , a dedicated career marketplace for WIRED readers. Companies who want to advertise their jobs can visit WIRED Hired to post open roles, while anyone can search and apply for thousands of career opportunities. Jobbio is not involved with this story or any editorial content.

You Might Also Like …

In your inbox: Get Plaintext —Steven Levy's long view on tech

Welcome to the hellhole of programmatic advertising

How many EV charging stations does the US need to replace gas stations?

A nonprofit tried to fix tech culture —but lost control of its own

It's always sunny: Here are the best sunglasses for every adventure

WIRED COUPONS

Save $7 To $23 On Turbo Tax Online

20% Off All H&R Block 2024 Tax Software | H&R Block Coupon

Enjoy $15 Off Your Orders With Instacart Coupon When You Spend $50

Extra 20% Off Select Dyson Technology With Owner Rewards

Get Up To An Extra 45% Off July Sale

Vista Print Coupon Code: 20% Off Select Signage

7 advanced ChatGPT prompt-writing tips you need to know

We've discussed how to issue effective prompts in previous articles here on ZDNET.

Special Feature

The intersection of generative ai and engineering.

The surge of generative AI can harness tremendous potential for the engineering realm. It can also come with its challenges, as enterprises and engineers alike figure out the impact of AI on their roles, business strategies, data, solutions, and product development. What does the future roadmap look like for bringing generative AI into the software fold? ZDNET decodes from all angles.

In this article, we're going to take it up a level and look at more advanced AI prompting techniques. 

We have seven very interesting approaches that will give you a much better handle on how to communicate with ChatGPT and other generative AI tools.

Also:  6 skills you need to become an AI prompt engineer

Here's how to level up your ChatGPT usage .

1. Specify output format

When you ask a question or give an assignment to ChatGPT , you can specify how it formats the reply. Imagine that you're giving an assignment to a student, where you might specify how the assignment is to be formatted when it's turned in. Here are a few examples.

What are the longest highways in the United States? List only the top four in the form of a bullet list.

Present that information in a table.

2. Tell it to format in HTML

You can specify a lot about how the results are displayed. For example, you can have it generate a table that you can incorporate into a web page.

What are the longest highways in the United States? List only the top four. Present the results as HTML.

You can make that HTML code bigger by clicking the square in the upper-right corner of the screenshot. 

Also: The 10 best ChatGPT plugins (and how to make the most of them)

Here's where it gets interesting. You can also have the information presented using whatever style of HTML you like. There's a school of web design that doesn't like the traditional table tags, and prefers to present tables in the form of CSS -- and here's that version.

Present that information, but use CSS instead of table tags

3. Iterate with multiple attempts

You often need to work with the AI to help it get to the result you want. Take our previous CSS result. Here's what it looks like:

Unfortunately, that's not as pretty as I'd like. Let's see if we can remedy it.

Redo that, but please make sure the columns are all aligned. Make the headings a darker blue with white lettering presented in all capitals and bold. Make each data row a light gray, but vary the levels of gray so row 1 is light gray, row 2 is slightly darker, row 3 is light gray, and so on. Make sure the highway name is presented in bold.

I'm not going to include the generated code, because it's long. But we're getting closer:

Let's try again.

That output looks really good, but the columns are still not aligned. Make sure the columns are wide enough to accommodate the text without wrapping, left align everything, and make sure all the columns (including the headings) are perfectly aligned.

It's almost exactly what we're looking for, but the route is wrapping. Let's see if we can fix that.

That's almost exactly what I want, but the route is wrapping. Please make sure the route data doesn't wrap either. Keep each line of data on exactly one line.

Don't ever assume prompting is easy. But if you've ever taught programming to humans, this is exactly the sort of result you get back. It sometimes seems like they're being passive-aggressive, but it's more likely that you didn't specify your requirements carefully enough.

4. Don't be afraid to use long prompts or sets of prompts

It took quite a few iterations to put together a prompt that reliably generated highway information in the format I wanted. One key approach is to make sure your prompt is very specific, but also extensive enough to have enough information for the large language model to fully understand what you're asking.

Also: Microsoft unveils first professional certificate for generative AI skills

You may also need to modify your specification. I wound up removing the line:

Create a table that uses only CSS to format the rows, columns, and cells. Do not use HTML table tags.

Instead, I just told it how I wanted the table to look and let it decide how to implement it. Here's my full, rather long prompt:

I wrote that prompt in Sublime Text , a text editor, and then pasted it into ChatGPT. Here's the result, which is exactly what I wanted.

As you can see, it chose to add a title, which was fine. But now that I have a working prompt, I can add some additional tweaks. For example, I went back and modified the columns specifier:

Create columns for the index number (label this "#"), highway name, length, and route

I tried changing "Limit your answer to only the top four" to "Limit your answer to only the top 20", but the AI refused to fill in all the data for all 20. So, I removed that line entirely and added a new line at the very end of the prompt:

For the purpose of this project, please provide full data results for the top 20 highways.

This actually resulted in a partial HTML output. I had to tell the AI to continue, at which point it spit out the rest of the HTML, resulting in this:

5. Provide explicit constraints to a response

You just saw how I modified some response constraints for the number of answers and the columns I wanted presented. But you can use constraints for more open-ended questions as well.

Also: Human or bot? This Turing test game puts your AI-spotting skills to the test

There are limits to this type of prompt. Take this example:

Provide a summary of the key events in World War II as reported by major newspapers of the time.

Because the model wasn't trained on newspapers from World War II, it's unable to answer the question (although it does take a guess).

Likewise, you can't specify any results from "the last few years" since the model's data entry ends in 2021. That said, you can specify data that's within the scope of the model, like this:

List major space missions between 2010 and 2020

Note that we're limiting by date. But we can add further constraints. Let's limit the data to just missions from the U.S.:

List major space missions conducted by NASA between 2010 and 2020

You can also go back to the formatting approach we discussed and do something like this:

List all major space missions conducted between 2010 and 2020. Group them by nation and space agency. Make the name of the nation and space agency bold.

And you can get even more explicit. Here we include continents and specify that any continents without missions be excluded from the list.

List all major space missions conducted between 2010 and 2020. Group them by continent. Make the name of the continent bold and all capital letters. Make the nation and space agency name bold, with either title case or all caps if that's how the space agency formats its name (like NASA). If a continent did not have a space mission, do not include it on this list.

Interestingly, the AI decided to have a bit of a hallucinatory moment. It properly listed the missions and continents, but decided Russia was a continent. I ran the prompt in a second session, and that time it did not think Russia was a continent.

6. Tell it number of words, sentences, characters

Speaking of constraints, you may have noticed that ChatGPT tends not to be accurate when it comes to word count. If you tell it to limit its answer to 50 words, it sometimes goes long or short. That's because the language model works in tokens (representations of data) that do not directly correspond to individual words.

Also:   This AI chatbot sums up PDFs and answers your questions about them

For example, when I told ChatGPT to "Summarize the Game of Thrones TV show", I got back 294 words over six paragraphs. But you can try to limit the response. Try out a variety of limiting terms until you determine what works best for you. For example:

Summarize the Game of Thrones TV series in 50 words  Summarize the Game of Thrones TV series in 2 sentences  Summarize the Game of Thrones TV series in less than 200 characters  Summarize the Game of Thrones TV series so it will fit in a tweet

Here's another place to keep in mind the restrictions of the AI model. ChatGPT contains no training data after 2021. At that time, a tweet was limited to 280 characters. But as of February 2023, Twitter Blue (now X Premium) subscribers can have tweets as long as 4,000 characters. Telling ChatGPT to fit something in a tweet tells it to limit the response to 280 characters, because that was the sole limit back in its day.

7. Give the AI the opportunity to evaluate its answers

As we've discussed, the AI often hallucinates, providing very wrong answers. It is possible to construct conversations with the AI to arrive at more precise answers, by letting it provide intermediate conclusions. Take this simple request:

Word similar to devolve that begins with a B

As difficult as it might be to imagine, ChatGPT reliably fails with this request, often answering decay, degrade, degenerate, and other words that begin with a "D".

There are a couple of challenges with this deceptively simple prompt. First, "devolve" has multiple meanings. It can mean transfer or delegate, deteriorate or decline, or inherit or receive by succession. To get a proper answer, we need to be more specific and give the AI the general meaning we want it to pursue. It also doesn't hurt to help it determine meaning by telling it we're looking for a verb, rather than a noun.

Generate a verb that starts with the letter "B" and has a similar meaning to "devolve," specifically indicating the idea of something deteriorating or getting worse.

The problem is that ChatGPT has a very difficult time (again, due to how it represents knowledge in tokens) of determining the first letter of a word. So, it's best to give the AI time to figure that out.

Determine the first letter of the generated verb

This period is what AI experts call "giving it time to breathe". Rather than just rushing out with its first answer, this approach gives the AI time to consider whether its answer is correct.

Also:   The best AI art generators

Because the AI may not come up with the right answer the first time, ask it to repeat the steps until it does:

And here, it works its way through until it finds an answer:

Notice how it took the AI six tries before it found the right word, even though the criteria existed for the entire sequence. The second double-check "breathe" gave it the opportunity to evaluate its answer and continue until it succeeded.

Bonus tip: Access current web info

If you want to access information after 2021, you can do so by using ChatGPT Plus and the WebPilot plugin. ChatGPT Plus isn't free, but for $20/month, the service can provide some considerable added value. Here are a few articles I've written that detail how WebPilot can substantially expand your prompt:

• My two favorite ChatGPT Plus plugins and the remarkable things I can do with them
• ChatGPT's new web-browsing feature is a big disappointment. Use this plugin instead
• I needed a mechanic. Here's how ChatGPT Plus helped me skip reading online reviews

Final thoughts

One thing that's really important to note is that the AI won't necessarily do what you want right out of the gate. On the example using "devolve" above, it took me almost two hours and about 20 tries to find the formula that actually worked for the AI to reliably generate a result.

Also:   How I used ChatGPT and AI art tools to launch my Etsy business fast

While we're at it, keep in mind that the AI remembers what went on in the current session. So, while it might give you the right answer in the current session, the acid test is copying your prompt to a brand-new session and seeing if it works there.

Stay tuned, because not only will I be back with more advanced prompt tips, I'll also be doing some deeper dives into individual prompting problem solvers.

You can follow my day-to-day project updates on social media. Be sure to follow me on Twitter at @DavidGewirtz , on Facebook at Facebook.com/DavidGewirtz , on Instagram at Instagram.com/DavidGewirtz , and on YouTube at YouTube.com/DavidGewirtzTV .

If you want a career in AI, start with these 5 steps

We need bold minds to challenge ai, not lazy prompt writers, bank cio says, what is artificial general intelligence.

How to use ChatGPT to write an essay

Reviewed By: Steve Hook

Table of Contents

What is the easiest way to write an essay, what’s the best ai to write an essay, can you use chatgpt to write essays, how to use ai to write an essay, launch chatgpt, customize your custom instructions, give chatgpt a prompt, limitations when using chatgpt to write an essay, what is the bot that writes essays, is there an ai that can write essays, final thoughts.

Whether you need an essay writer or a speed boost for that last-minute assignment, you may be wondering how to use ChatGPT to write an essay . Since its public release in November 2022, OpenAI’s AI Chatbot has seen several updates to the quality of natural language processing (NLP) that guides it toward a high-quality, human writing style suitable for essays.

The AI bot, created by OpenAI, has been making headlines for its ability to communicate in a way that mimics human dialogue. But that’s not all! In fact, the AI model can also do some pretty wicked stuff such as essay writing, language translations, and quite recently passing university-level exams . However, it is also worth noting that colleges and universities can detect ChatGPT , and services like Turnitin will flag ChatGPT-generated content.

So while you can use ChatGPT to write an essay, we’d advise only doing so as a starting point for your own work – AI inspiration if you will. It’s fair and undetectable to use artificial intelligence for guidance, to help move past writing blocks and create your own essays.

To exemplify this, the following are excerpts from an essay that ChatGPT wrote based on the prompt “Write an essay about natural language processing”. NLP is the technology that allows the AI Chatbot to write in such a way, based on such a command.

“The genesis of NLP traces back to the 1950s, with the advent of machine translation. The Georgetown experiment in 1954 was a seminal moment, showcasing the potential of machines in translating languages. However, early optimism was curtailed by the enormity of linguistic nuances. The 1966 ALPAC report marked a period of reduced funding and interest in NLP, citing the high error rates and the lack of understanding of contextual meanings.” An excerpt from the essay generated by ChatGPT

The use of ChatGPT is frowned upon by academia, and likely won’t reflect your writing style anyway. As a result, you’ll still need to rewrite it. The best AI chatbots can take an example of your writing, and use it to customize the tone of the generated text with greater understanding. Older models like GPT-2 were not reliable in this respect, although current models like GPT-3 (especially GPT-3.5 with fine-tuning ) are both serviceable and free to use for essay writing.

The most advanced models, such as GPT-4 accessible via the ChatGPT Plus or ChatGPT Enterprise plan from OpenAI, are the best options for writing your essays. While GPT-4 is not open-source , it is better than essentially all of the immediate competition.

This is true even of Microsoft’s Copilot (formerly Bing Chat), with which ChatGPT shares an LLM — namely GPT-4; Despite the shared language model, ChatGPT offers superior functionality, especially considering the “ All Tools ” update which enables Browse with Bing, Advanced Data Analysis, Plugins, and DALL·E 3 at the same time.

Many users have been putting ChatGPT to the test, by asking the large language model to write essays. Surprisingly, these essays came out well-written and completely coherent, although they lacked the originality you get from human writers. A Twitter user even asked it to write their (slightly tongue-in-cheek) Havard application essay.

Without a doubt, ChatGPT essay writing is starting to be all the more common, but as above we would advise caution when using it. It also has various limitations which we outline below. So, thanks to the increase in ChatGPT detectors, and teachers and professors starting to ‘get wise’ to essays written by artificial intelligence, there is a real risk you could get caught if you, say, actually submit a college essay written by ChatGPT. Our recommendation is don’t; use the powerful tool as a guide for your own writing process and work.

Chat GPT is not the only AI that can write essays. Google Bard and Microsoft Copilot (formerly Bing Chat) can also write a high-quality essay. This tech, when paired with an AI checker like GPTZero allows students to circumvent AI detection tools used by their professors. Typically, these major language models will have no issues with grammar . However, a grammar checker like Grammarly would not go amiss.

The process of using these AI-text generation tools is pretty much identical, no matter which you choose. So, let’s take a look at that process!

To start things off, head to the ChatGPT website and sign in with your login details. Alternatively, you can access ChatGPT via the mobile app for Android or iOS.

At this point, it is pretty common to be faced with a capacity error from OpenAI. In most cases, if you wait a couple of minutes you will be let in. If this is not the case, you can read our article here which shows you how to fix it.

Custom instructions are a new feature that improves the user experience by giving you greater control over ChatGPT responses. Instead of controlling how the AI chatbot responds by including instructions within the prompt itself, custom instructions stay how you set them for each new chat interaction unless changed.

To use them via web browser, click on the ‘Settings’ option to open up ChatGPT settings. You will see an option called ‘Custom instructions’.

If you’re using the iOS or Android app, you can turn on custom instructions by going to ‘Settings’, clicking on ‘New features’, and turning on ‘Custom instructions’.

ChatGPT custom instructions are now available for all users (Except EU & UK which is coming soon). Announced via OpenAI blog post on August 9th, 2023, the release notes show that neither ChatGPT Plus nor ChatGPT Enterprise are required to access the feature.

Now that you are logged in, you should be presented with the ChatGPT opening page and search bar. To get ChatGPT to generate an essay you will need to type a prompt into the search bar and click the send button.

Note, that the more detail you give ChatGPT the more specific your essay will be. For example, you can tell ChatGPT the length of the essay, to include references and the number of paragraphs.

Here are a couple examples:

• Write a 400-word essay about the impact of climate change including references
• Write a 4-paragraph essay about the causes of World War One

After ChatGPT has generated your essay you can ask the model to edit its response by typing and submitting “make it longer” or “write it again”.

To ensure your essay is the best it could be, we recommend making some edits. You can copy and paste ChatGPT’s response into a word processor such as Word or Google Docs to make some changes.

Ideally, rewriting the essay in your own words would be best, although tweaking ChatGPT’s response also works. At this stage, it is definitely important to proofread the essay and double check any facts with other sources to mitigate against ChatGPT’s accuracy limitation.

It may also be useful to run the essay through a plagiarism checker, such as Turnitin, to ensure your essay is safe from plagiarism .

In odd cases that require a specific voice, or character, you could try a ChatGPT alternative like Beta Character AI . It’s helpful to have more than one option to choose from when ChatGPT is down, or you can’t connect to Character.ai. Here’s how to make your own AI chatbot Character, and why you might prefer it compared to ChatGPT .

Essential AI Tools

Content Guardian – AI Content Checker – One-click, Eight Checks

• FREE 7 DAY TRIAL
• Find out more

There are a few things you should be wary of when using ChatGPT to write an essay. The first issue surrounds ChatGPT’s accuracy. OpenAI warns its users that the model may produce some inaccuracies that could have an obvious negative impact on their essays. The company also states that the application has the potential to produce biased responses too. This is definitely something you should be aware of, as there is a possibility that your essay could be incorrect and will need revising.

These issues are not unique to ChatGPT and can be observed in other popular LLMs (Large Language Models) like Google Bard and Microsoft Copilot (formerly Bing Chat). Ultimately, it’s functionally impossible to remove bias from an LLM at the source because the training data was produced by humans who themselves are inherently biased. Instead, the company running the LLM and its public-facing interface (ChatGPT) can add censorship filters at the end of the generation process – an imperfect solution, but more practical (and philosophically possible) than the alternative.

Another major concern is plagiarism. Plagiarism is definitely something to be concerned about when using AI to write your assignments. According to OpenAI, ChatGPT does not necessarily copy specific pieces of text that can be found somewhere else. But, it does have the capability to word its response in a way that is closely similar. The best way to check this is by putting the essay through a high-quality plagiarism checker, such as Turnitin.

OpenAI’s ChatGPT isn’t the only AI software that could help you write an essay. Here are some other AI essay writers you could try out:

• Microsoft Copilot (formerly Bing Chat) – Since the free version of ChatGPT isn’t connected to the internet, you may want a tool that can provide an up-to-date outline based on relevant and recent data. Copilot can be that tool, as it is powered by ChatGPT but is also web-connected. It also uses GPT-4, OpenAI’s current most advanced machine learning model, for free – a privilege you must pay for when using ChatGPT.
• Jasper AI – Can produce long-form AI content automatically and can continue building content based on past paragraphs you have written. The starting price is $29 per month.
• ContentBot – Can create short-form ideas to long-form text such as blog posts and essays. An interactive tool that allows you to contribute to some of the essay writing. The starting price is free.

NOW READ The best  free AI essay writer  tools.

How to use ChatGPT to write an essay on mobile

OpenAI released the official ChatGPT iOS app on Thursday, May 18th, 2023. This was then followed by the ChatGPT Android app on Wednesday, July 26th, 2023.

These apps offer all of the same functionality (most of the time, as development cycles rarely sync up perfectly). You can download the ChatGPT mobile app to help write an essay on the go!

So that’s all you need to know about writing essays using ChatGPT. With the help of ChatGPT, you, and the right inputs and prompts, you can get a great start on essays around a wide range of topics. It also has the added bonus of being able to check for grammar, punctuation, and clarity.

There are some limitations, however, where the AI chatbot falls down, namely, its inaccuracies. We’d recommend that if you are going to use ChatGPT to help you write essays, you use it to assist with a rough draft or to give you essay ideas, rather than getting it to do the whole thing.

• NOW READ Can universities detect ChatGPT?

Funmi Somoye

Funmi joined PC Guide in November 2022, and was a driving force for the site's ChatGPT coverage. She has a wide knowledge of AI apps, gaming and consumer technology.

How to use Snapchat Dreams – step-by-step guide to…

How to slow down a video on snapchat –…, how to get a yellow heart on snapchat –…, how to hide and unhide chats on snapchat.

• Gradehacker
• Meet the Team
• Essay Writing
• Degree Accelerator
• Entire Class Bundle
• Learning Center
• Gradehacker TV

How to use Chat GPT to Write an Essay

Florencia basavilbaso.

• Best Apps And Tools , Writing Tips

Content Writer At Gradehacker

• February, 2023

If you want to speed up the essay-writing process with AI, here you’ll learn which are the basic tips you need to know to write an essay with Chat GPT.

How to Write an Essay With Chat GPT

To write an essay with Chat GPT, these are the four basic tips you need to know:

• Edit and refine the generated text
• Write a clear and concise prompt
• Take time to learn about Chat GPT
• Add your own thoughts to make it personal

Having problems to write your essay?

If Chat GPT isn’t enough and you need help with a last-minute paper, we are here to help you!

Having problems writing?

By now, you’ve probably heard about Chat GPT; an amazing AI that can (almost) write original content as if it was a real human being. So, now you are wondering how to use Chat GPT to write an essay. 

For that, we created this blog to guide you through each step so you can take all the benefits this platform has for you and use it in your favor.

Here at Gradehacker , we’ve been years dedicated to helping and improving non-traditional student’s life in multiple ways! Besides assisting them with their classes and essays , we are the most trusted resource for valuable information and tips that can change the way you work!

And today, we introduce you to Chat GPT !

This AI can help you write a college essay quickly and efficiently. If you want to know how to use chat GPT to write an essay, learn what are its pros and cons, and incorporate the best tips to change how you approach your essays, you are in the right place! 

Let’s start!

What is Chat GPT?

First, we’ll address some basics here. Let’s talk about what this platform is and what it can do for you!

ChatGPT (Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer) is a natural language processing technology that uses artificial intelligence to generate text based on a prompt. It can be used to generate ideas, structure sentences, and even create entire essays.

This computer program was created by the artificial intelligence research laboratory OpenAI and launched on November 30, 2022. It is still a pretty new platform and has a lot to improve, but it also has several advantages that can do more good than bad for you!

It is free to the public, but we recommend taking advantage of their free service as long as you can because it was created with the intention of monetizing the service in the future.

Meaning, Chat GPT won’t continue being free for too long.

Another interesting fact is that the service works best in English but is also able to function in some other languages.

What Can You Use Chat GPT For?

So, after reading what Chat GPT is, you are probably wondering what you can use it for.

Programs like this one which can generate text based on a prompt, are good for:

• When you want to save time and don't feel inspired to write
• Don't know how to continue what you started
• Getting ideas
• Start a project

We always recommend checking and editing the text because it’s not always accurate , and the information is often wrong, especially when it comes to dates, rates, or anything very specific.

But of course, there are other ways you can use Chat GPT. 

It can help you create a title for your essay topics, text for an announcement or copywriting, an article, or what you came for: an essay!

And that leads us to the main question: how do we use it?

How to Use Chat GPT to Write an Essay

If this AI is appropriately used, it can become the saver you’ve been yearning for. 

In short, to write an essay with Chat GPT, you need to follow this process:

2) Put a command 

3) Change the command until you get the desired outcome

Now let’s see how it works.

To start, let’s go to Chat GPT website and press where it says “ Try Chat GPT “

Once we log in, at the bottom of the page you’ll find a text box where you will need to write a command. This could be the title of the essay, a topic sentence, or even a few keywords. 

After providing the prompt, Chat GPT will generate text based on it.

The text will come out as a number of items containing specific ideas about the topic we asked for.  

Then, as a new command, you can ask Chat GPT to expand on the previous information.

Because Chat GPT remembers the previous information generated, you can also ask it to write more information from a specific item. In order to do that, you can go where you wrote your first command and, this time, put something like: “write essay line (or paragraph) about (item number).” 

You can also command multiple things at once , for example: “write an essay introduction with heading about item 7,”  or you can even command to do it for every item.

You can then edit and refine the generated text to make your essay unique and give it a personal touch as it would be with human writing.

Do you need a step-by-step tutorial on how to write an essay with Chat GPT?

If you want to use Chat GPT to write an entire essay from scratch , you can read our entire experience or check out our videos!

Pros and Cons of Using Chat GPT

As with any technology, there are both advantages and disadvantages to using Chat GPT.

Pros of Chat GPT

On the plus side, we can say that:

• It is much faster than traditional writing methods, and it can save you time and effort when writing an essay
• It can help you come up with ideas to get started on a project and structure your essay in a more organized way
• Reduces the need for research , as it can generate text based on the prompt without any additional input.
• It can provide you with information that is relevant to your topic
• It can help you refine and edit your text to make it unique

Cons of Chat GPT

But we know that Chat GPT is not perfect, so on the downside, it is essential to note that:

• Sometimes it can generate text that is not accurate , has incorrect premises, and is irrelevant to the prompt
• It can be challenging to use if you are not familiar with natural language processing technology
• You may have difficulty editing and refining the generated text to make it unique and personal
• It could end up being time-consuming if you don't know how to use the platform correctly
• Because it is trained on data, it may contain inherent biases, and this can be reflected in the outputted text

It is important to be aware of the potential for bias when using Chat GPT to generate essays , as this could lead to inaccurate or offensive results.

Also, be aware of the possibility of plagiarism when using it, as this could lead to serious consequences. Taking the time to check for plagiarism before submitting a written essay is essential to ensure its originality and accuracy.

And to save yourself from falling into those situations, be sure to read our blog post on how to avoid unintentional plagiarism.

How to Avoid Plagiarism When Using Chat GPT

To avoid plagiarism when using Chat GPT to write an essay, it is critical to double-check any generated content before submitting it. Using a reliable plagiarism checker is also helpful to ensure the content is entirely original.

These are some plagiarism software you can use:

If you want to know how these platforms work, check our video, where we’ll show you what they do, why they’re useful, and why they’re better than the rest.

Chat GPT Plus

One of the biggest problems with Chat GPT is that it might not always be available to use.

Many times, when we go to the website, what can happen is that there are a lot of people using it, which will create high traffic. When that happens, it will appear on the screen a text that says:

“ChatGPT is at capacity right now. Get notified when we’re back .” 

There, you can click on get notified, put your email address, and wait until the traffic slows down.

But if you don’t want to deal with waiting to be notified, there is an alternative choice: subscribe to  Chat GPT Plus.

By subscribing, you’ll gain:

• Access to ChatGPT at all times, even during the busiest periods
• Faster response times
• Priority access to new features and improvements

The subscription has a price of $20 per month and is only available for customers in the United States.

Having doubts on how we can help you?

Get in touch with us!

Tips for Using Chat GPT

If you decide to use Chat GPT to write your essay, there are a few tips that can help you get the most out of it.

• Provide a clear and concise prompt: This will help Chat GPT generate the most accurate and relevant text.
• Edit, add your own thoughts, and refine the generated text to make it unique and personal
• If you are not familiar with natural language processing technology, take some time to learn about it before using Chat GPT

These tips will make a difference in your work, especially for those long essays where you need to do a lot of research. 

Knowing how to write a research paper or an argumentative essay is highly necessary and essential for a college student, even if you have Chat GPT helping you throughout the process, so in case you are unsure or need to refresh that, check out our video about it! 

Make Your Writing Stand Out When Using Chat GPT to Write an Essay

With our tips and guidance on how to make your essays stand out when using Chat GPT and the potential pitfalls to avoid, you’ll be in a great position to produce high-quality essays.

On the other side, you may like to know that here at Gradehacker, we offer college essays , classes and degree help services to help students like you reach their highest potential.

To check more helpful information, check our blogs:

What You Need For Your College Research Paper Outline

5 Common Essay Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

Best AI to Write Essays

Best Apps For Writing 2024 | Boost Your Writing Skills

How Much Does it Cost to Write My Essay?

Write an Essay From Scratch With Chat GPT: Step-by-Step Tutorial

Florencia Basavilbaso is a content creator passioned for writing, music, films, and the arts. At Gradehacker, she helps to improve non-traditional students life’s by finding and providing the most useful information, so they can always progress. You can find her on LinkedIn .

• Best Apps and Tools
• Writing Tips
• Financial Tips and Scholarships
• Career Planning
• Non-Traditional Students
• Student Wellness
• Cost & Pricing

• 2525 Ponce de Leon Blvd Suite 300 Coral Gables, FL 33134 USA
• Phone: (786) 991-9293
• Gradehacker 2525 Ponce de Leon Blvd Suite 300 Coral Gables, FL 33134 USA

About Gradehacker

Business hours.

Mon - Fri: 10:00 am - 7 pm ET ​​Sat - Sun: 10 am - 3 pm ET ​

© 2024 Gradehacker LLC All Rights Reserved.

Choose Your Test

• Search Blogs By Category
• College Admissions
• AP and IB Exams
• GPA and Coursework

Can You Use ChatGPT for Your College Essay?

College Admissions , College Essays

ChatGPT has become a popular topic of conversation since its official launch in November 2022. The artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot can be used for all sorts of things, like having conversations, answering questions, and even crafting complete pieces of writing.

If you’re applying for college, you might be wondering about ChatGPT college admissions’ potential.  Should you use a ChatGPT college essay in your application ?

By the time you finish reading this article, you’ll know much more about ChatGPT, including how students can use it responsibly and if it’s a good idea to use ChatGPT on college essays . We’ll answer all your questions, like:

• What is ChatGPT and why are schools talking about it?
• What are the good and bad aspects of ChatGPT?
• Should you use ChatGPT for college essays and applications?
• Can colleges detect ChatGPT?
• Are there other tools and strategies that students can use, instead?

We’ve got a lot to cover, so let’s get started!

Schools and colleges are worried about how new AI technology affects how students learn. (Don't worry. Robots aren't replacing your teachers...yet.)

What Is ChatGPT and Why Are Schools Talking About It?

ChatGPT (short for “Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer”) is a chatbot created by OpenAI , an artificial intelligence research company. ChatGPT can be used for various tasks, like having human-like conversations, answering questions, giving recommendations, translating words and phrases—and writing things like essays. 

In order to do this, ChatGPT uses a neural network that’s been trained on thousands of resources to predict relationships between words. When you give ChatGPT a task, it uses that knowledge base to interpret your input or query. It then analyzes its data banks to predict the combinations of words that will best answer your question. 

So while ChatGPT might seem like it’s thinking, it’s actually pulling information from hundreds of thousands of resources , then answering your questions by looking for patterns in that data and predicting which words come next.  

Why Schools Are Concerned About ChatGPT

Unsurprisingly, schools are worried about ChatGPT and its misuse, especially in terms of academic dishonesty and plagiarism . Most schools, including colleges, require students’ work to be 100% their own. That’s because taking someone else’s ideas and passing them off as your own is stealing someone else’s intellectual property and misrepresenting your skills. 

The problem with ChatGPT from schools’ perspective is that it does the writing and research for you, then gives you the final product. In other words, you’re not doing the work it takes to complete an assignment when you’re using ChatGPT , which falls under schools’ plagiarism and dishonesty policies.  

Colleges are also concerned with how ChatGPT will negatively affect students’ critical thinking, research, and writing skills . Essays and other writing assignments are used to measure students’ mastery of the material, and if students submit ChatGPT college essays, teachers will just be giving feedback on an AI’s writing…which doesn’t help the student learn and grow. 

Beyond that, knowing how to write well is an important skill people need to be successful throughout life. Schools believe that if students rely on ChatGPT to write their essays, they’re doing more than just plagiarizing—they’re impacting their ability to succeed in their future careers. 

Many Schools Have Already Banned ChatGPT

Schools have responded surprisingly quickly to AI use, including ChatGPT. Worries about academic dishonesty, plagiarism, and mis/disinformation have led many high schools and colleges to ban the use of ChatGPT . Some schools have begun using AI-detection software for assignment submissions, and some have gone so far as to block students from using ChatGPT on their internet networks. 

It’s likely that schools will begin revising their academic honesty and plagiarism policies to address the use of AI tools like ChatGPT. You’ll want to stay up-to-date with your schools’ policies. 

ChatGPT is pretty amazing...but it's not a great tool for writing college essays. Here's why.

ChatGPT: College Admissions and Entrance Essays

College admissions essays—also called personal statements—ask students to explore important events, experiences, and ideas from their lives. A great entrance essay will explain what makes you you !  

ChatGPT is a machine that doesn’t know and can’t understand your experiences. That means using ChatGPT to write your admissions essays isn’t just unethical. It actually puts you at a disadvantage because ChatGPT can’t adequately showcase what it means to be you. 

Let’s take a look at four ways ChatGPT negatively impacts college admissions essays.

#1: ChatGPT Lacks Insight

We recommend students use u nexpected or slightly unusual topics because they help admissions committees learn more about you and what makes you unique. The chat bot doesn’t know any of that, so nothing ChatGPT writes can’t accurately reflect your experience, passions, or goals for the future. 

Because ChatGPT will make guesses about who you are, it won’t be able to share what makes you unique in a way that resonates with readers. And since that’s what admissions counselors care about, a ChatGPT college essay could negatively impact an otherwise strong application.  

#2: ChatGPT Might Plagiarize 

Writing about experiences that many other people have had isn’t a very strong approach to take for entrance essays . After all, you don’t want to blend in—you want to stand out! 

If you write your essay yourself and include key details about your past experiences and future goals, there’s little risk that you’ll write the same essay as someone else. But if you use ChatGPT—who’s to say someone else won’t, too? Since ChatGPT uses predictive guesses to write essays, there’s a good chance the text it uses in your essay already appeared in someone else’s.  

Additionally, ChatGPT learns from every single interaction it has. So even if your essay isn’t plagiarized, it’s now in the system. That means the next person who uses ChatGPT to write their essay may end up with yours. You’ll still be on the hook for submitting a ChatGPT college essay, and someone else will be in trouble, too.

#3: ChatGPT Doesn’t Understand Emotion 

Keep in mind that ChatGPT can’t experience or imitate emotions, and so its writing samples lack, well, a human touch ! 

A great entrance essay will explore experiences or topics you’re genuinely excited about or proud of . This is your chance to show your chosen schools what you’ve accomplished and how you’ll continue growing and learning, and an essay without emotion would be odd considering that these should be real, lived experiences and passions you have!

#4: ChatGPT Produced Mediocre Results

If you’re still curious what would happen if you submitted a ChatGPT college essay with your application, you’re in luck. Both Business Insider and Forbes asked ChatGPT to write a couple of college entrance essays, and then they sent them to college admissions readers to get their thoughts. 

The readers agreed that the essays would probably pass as being written by real students—assuming admissions committees didn’t use AI detection software—but that they both were about what a “very mediocre, perhaps even a middle school, student would produce.” The admissions professionals agreed that the essays probably wouldn’t perform very well with entrance committees, especially at more selective schools.  

That’s not exactly the reaction you want when an admission committee reads your application materials! So, when it comes to ChatGPT college admissions, it’s best to steer clear and write your admission materials by yourself. 

Can Colleges Detect ChatGPT?

We’ve already explained why it’s not a great idea to use ChatGPT to write your college essays and applications , but you may still be wondering: can colleges detect ChatGPT? 

In short, yes, they can! 

Software Can Detect ChatGPT

As technology improves and increases the risk of academic dishonesty, plagiarism, and mis/disinformation, software that can detect such technology is improving, too. For instance, OpenAI, the same company that built ChatGPT, is working on a text classifier that can tell the difference between AI-written text and human-written text .  

Turnitin, one of the most popular plagiarism detectors used by high schools and universities, also recently developed the AI Innovation Lab —a detection software designed to flag submissions that have used AI tools like ChatGPT. Turnitin says that this tool works with 98% confidence in detecting AI writing. 

Plagiarism and AI companies aren’t the only ones interested in AI-detection software. A 22-year old computer science student at Princeton created an app to detect ChatGPT writing, called Zero GPT. This software works by measuring the complexity of ideas and variety of sentence structures.  

Human Readers Can Detect ChatGPT 

It’s also worth keeping in mind that teachers can spot the use of ChatGPT themselves , even if it isn’t confirmed by a software detector. For example, if you’ve turned in one or two essays to your teacher already, they’re probably familiar with your unique writing style. If you submit a college essay draft essay that uses totally different vocabulary, sentence structures, and figures of speech, your teacher will likely take note.

Additionally , admissions committees and readers may be able to spot ChatGPT writing, too. ChatGPT (and AI writing, in general) uses more simplistic sentence structures with less variation, so that could make it easier to tell if you’ve submitted a ChatGPT college essay. These professionals also read thousands of essays every year, which means they know what a typical essay reads like. You want your college essay to catch their attention…but not because you used AI software! 

If you use ChatGPT responsibly, you can be as happy as these kids.

Pros and Cons of ChatGPT: College Admissions Edition

ChatGPT is a brand new technology, which means we’re still learning about the ways it can benefit us. It’s important to think about the pros and the cons to any new tool …and that includes artificial intelligence!

Let’s look at some of the good—and not-so-good—aspects of ChatGPT below. 

ChatGPT: The Good

It may seem like we’re focused on just the negatives of using ChatGPT in this article, but we’re willing to admit that the chatbot isn’t all bad. In fact, it can be a very useful tool for learning if used responsibly !

Like we already mentioned, students shouldn’t use ChatGPT to write entire essays or assignments. They can use it, though, as a learning tool alongside their own critical thinking and writing skills.

Students can use ChatGPT responsibly to:

• Learn more about a topic . It’s a great place to get started for general knowledge and ideas about most subjects.
• Find reputable and relevant sources on a topic. Students can ask ChatGPT for names and information about leading scholars, relevant websites and databases, and more. 
• Brainstorm ideas for assignments. Students can share the ideas they already have with ChatGPT, and in return, the chatbot can suggest ideas for further exploration and even organization of their points.
• Check work (that they’ve written themselves!) for errors or cla rity. This is similar to how spell- and grammar-checking software is used. ChatGPT may be even better than some competitors for this, because students can actually ask ChatGPT to explain the errors and their solutions—not just to fix them. 

Before you use ChatGPT—even for the tasks mentioned above—you should talk to your teacher or school about their AI and academic dishonesty policies. It’s also a good idea to include an acknowledgement that you used ChatGPT with an explanation of its use. 

This guy made some bad decisions using ChatGPT. Don't be this guy.

ChatGPT: The Bad

The first model of ChatGPT (GPT-3.5) was formally introduced to the public in November 2022, and the newer model (GPT-4) in March 2023. So, it’s still very new and there’s a lot of room for improvement .  

There are many misconceptions about ChatGPT. One of the most extreme is that the AI is all-knowing and can make its own decisions. Another is that ChatGPT is a search engine that, when asked a question, can just surf the web for timely, relevant resources and give you all of that information. Both of these beliefs are incorrect because ChatGPT is limited to the information it’s been given by OpenAI . 

Remember how the ‘PT’ in ChatGPT stands for “Pre-trained”? That means that every time OpenAI gives ChatGPT an update, it’s given more information to work with (and so it has more information to share with you). In other words, it’s “trained” on information so it can give you the most accurate and relevant responses possible—but that information can be limited and biased . Ultimately, humans at OpenAI decide what pieces of information to share with ChatGPT, so it’s only as accurate and reliable as the sources it has access to.

For example, if you were to ask ChatGPT-3.5 what notable headlines made the news last week, it would respond that it doesn’t have access to that information because its most recent update was in September 2021!

You’re probably already familiar with how easy it can be to come across misinformation, misleading and untrue information on the internet. Since ChatGPT can’t tell the difference between what is true and what isn’t, it’s up to the humans at OpenAI to make sure only accurate and true information is given to the chatbot . This leaves room for human error , and users of ChatGPT have to keep that in mind when using and learning from the chatbot.

These are just the most obvious problems with ChatGPT. Some other problems with the chatbot include:

• A lack of common sense. ChatGPT can create seemingly sensical responses to many questions and topics, but it doesn’t have common sense or complete background knowledge.
• A lack of empathy. ChatGPT doesn’t have emotions, so it can’t understand them, either. 
• An inability to make decisions or problem solve . While the chatbot can complete basic tasks like answering questions or giving recommendations, it can’t solve complex tasks. 

While there are some great uses for ChatGPT, it’s certainly not without its flaws.

Our bootcamp can help you put together amazing college essays that help you get into your dream schools—no AI necessary.

What Other Tools and Strategies Can Help Students Besides ChatGPT?

While it’s not a good idea to use ChatGPT for college admissions materials, it’s not the only tool available to help students with college essays and assignments.

One of the best strategies students can use to write good essays is to make sure they give themselves plenty of time for the assignment. The writing process includes much more than just drafting! Having time to brainstorm ideas, write out a draft, revise it for clarity and completeness, and polish it makes for a much stronger essay. 

Teachers are another great resource students can use, especially for college application essays. Asking a teacher (or two!) for feedback can really help students improve the focus, clarity, and correctness of an essay. It’s also a more interactive way to learn—being able to sit down with a teacher to talk about their feedback can be much more engaging than using other tools.

Using expert resources during the essay writing process can make a big difference, too. Our article outlines a complete list of strategies for students writing college admission essays. It breaks down what the Common Application essay is, gives tips for choosing the best essay topic, offers strategies for staying focused and being specific, and more.

You can also get help from people who know the college admissions process best, like former admissions counselors. PrepScholar’s Admissions Bootcamp guides you through the entire application process , and you’ll get insider tips and tricks from real-life admissions counselors that’ll make your applications stand out. Even better, our bootcamp includes step-by-step essay writing guidance, so you can get the help you need to make sure your essay is perfect.

If you’re hoping for more technological help, Grammarly is another AI tool that can check writing for correctness. It can correct things like misused and misspelled words and grammar mistakes, and it can improve your tone and style. 

It’s also widely available across multiple platforms through a Windows desktop app, an Android and iOS app, and a Google Chrome extension. And since Grammarly just checks your writing without doing any of the work for you, it’s totally safe to use on your college essays. 

The Bottom Line: ChatGPT College Admissions and Essays

ChatGPT will continue to be a popular discussion topic as it continues evolving. You can expect your chosen schools to address ChatGPT and other AI tools in their academic honesty and plagiarism policies in the near future—and maybe even to restrict or ban the use of the chatbot for school admissions and assignments.

As AI continues transforming, so will AI-detection. The goal is to make sure that AI is used responsibly by students so that they’re avoiding plagiarism and building their research, writing, and critical thinking skills. There are some great uses for ChatGPT when used responsibly, but you should always check with your teachers and schools beforehand.

ChatGPT’s “bad” aspects still need improving, and that’s going to take some time.Be aware that the chatbot isn’t even close to perfect, and it needs to be fact-checked just like other sources of information.

Similarly to other school assignments, don’t submit a ChatGPT college essay for college applications, either. College entrance essays should outline unique and interesting personal experiences and ideas, and those can only come from you.  

Just because ChatGPT isn’t a good idea doesn’t mean there aren’t resources to help you put together a great college essay. There are many other tools and strategies you can use instead of ChatGPT , many of which have been around for longer and offer better feedback. 

What’s Next?

Ready to write your college essays the old-fashioned way? Start here with our comprehensive guide to the admissions essays.  

Most students have to submit essays as part of their Common Application . Here's a complete breakdown of the Common App prompts —and how to answer them.

The most common type of essay answers the "why this college?" prompt. We've got an expert breakdown that shows you how to write a killer response , step by step. 

Trending Now

How to Get Into Harvard and the Ivy League

How to Get a Perfect 4.0 GPA

How to Write an Amazing College Essay

What Exactly Are Colleges Looking For?

ACT vs. SAT: Which Test Should You Take?

When should you take the SAT or ACT?

Get Your Free

Find Your Target SAT Score

Free Complete Official SAT Practice Tests

How to Get a Perfect SAT Score, by an Expert Full Scorer

Score 800 on SAT Math

Score 800 on SAT Reading and Writing

How to Improve Your Low SAT Score

Score 600 on SAT Math

Score 600 on SAT Reading and Writing

Find Your Target ACT Score

Complete Official Free ACT Practice Tests

How to Get a Perfect ACT Score, by a 36 Full Scorer

Get a 36 on ACT English

Get a 36 on ACT Math

Get a 36 on ACT Reading

Get a 36 on ACT Science

How to Improve Your Low ACT Score

Get a 24 on ACT English

Get a 24 on ACT Math

Get a 24 on ACT Reading

Get a 24 on ACT Science

Stay Informed

Get the latest articles and test prep tips!

Ashley Sufflé Robinson has a Ph.D. in 19th Century English Literature. As a content writer for PrepScholar, Ashley is passionate about giving college-bound students the in-depth information they need to get into the school of their dreams.

Ask a Question Below

Have any questions about this article or other topics? Ask below and we'll reply!

ChatGPT: Here's What You Get With the Gen AI Tool That Started It All

ChatGPT quickly swept us away with its mind-blowing skills. Its latest model, GPT-4o, is faster, cheaper and can generate more text than its predecessors.

• Shankland covered the tech industry for more than 25 years and was a science writer for five years before that. He has deep expertise in microprocessors, digital photography, computer hardware and software, internet standards, web technology, and more.

In late 2022, OpenAI wowed the world when it introduced ChatGPT , a chatbot with an entirely new level of power, breadth and usefulness, thanks to the generative AI technology behind it. Since then, ChatGPT has continued to evolve, including its most recent development: the launch of its GPT-4o model .

ChatGPT and generative AI aren't a novelty anymore, but keeping track of what they can do poses a challenge as new abilities arrive. Most notably, OpenAI now provides easier access to anyone who wants to use it. It also lets anyone write custom AI apps called GPTs and share them on its own app store, while on a smaller scale ChatGPT can now speak its responses to you. OpenAI has been leading the generative AI charge , but it's hotly pursued by Microsoft, Google and startups far and wide.

Generative AI still hasn't shaken a core problem -- it makes up information that sounds plausible but isn't necessarily correct. But there's no denying AI has fired the imaginations of computer scientists, loosened the purse strings of venture capitalists and caught the attention of everyone from teachers to doctors to artists and more, all wondering how AI will change their work and their lives. 

If you're trying to get a handle on ChatGPT, this FAQ is for you. Here's a look at what's up.

Read more :  ChatGPT 3.5 Review: First Doesn't Mean Best

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is an online chatbot that responds to "prompts" -- text requests that you type. ChatGPT has countless uses . You can request relationship advice, a summarized history of punk rock or an explanation of the ocean's tides. It's particularly good at writing software, and it can also handle some other technical tasks, like creating 3D models .

ChatGPT is called a generative AI because it generates these responses on its own. But it can also display more overtly creative output like screenplays, poetry, jokes and student essays. That's one of the abilities that really caught people's attention.

Much of AI has been focused on specific tasks, but ChatGPT is a general-purpose tool. This puts it more into a category like a search engine.

That breadth makes it powerful but also hard to fully control. OpenAI has many mechanisms in place to try to screen out abuse and other problems, but there's an active cat-and-mouse game afoot by researchers and others who try to get ChatGPT to do things like offer bomb-making recipes.

ChatGPT really blew people's minds when it began passing tests. For example, AnsibleHealth researchers reported in 2023 that " ChatGPT performed at or near the passing threshold " for the United States Medical Licensing Exam, suggesting that AI chatbots "may have the potential to assist with medical education, and potentially, clinical decision-making."

We're a long way from fully fledged doctor-bots you can trust, but the computing industry is investing billions of dollars to solve the problems and expand AI into new domains like visual data, too. OpenAI is among those at the vanguard. So strap in, because the AI journey is going to be a sometimes terrifying, sometimes exciting thrill.

What's ChatGPT's origin?

Artificial intelligence algorithms had been ticking away for years before ChatGPT arrived. These systems were a big departure from traditional programming, which follows a rigid if-this-then-that approach. AI, in contrast, is trained to spot patterns in complex real-world data. AI has been busy for more than a decade screening out spam, identifying our friends in photos, recommending videos and translating our Alexa voice commands into computerese.

A Google technology called transformers helped propel AI to a new level, leading to a type of AI called a large language model, or LLM . These AIs are trained on enormous quantities of text, including material like books, blog posts, forum comments and news articles. The training process internalizes the relationships between words, letting chatbots process input text and then generate what it believes to be appropriate output text. 

A second phase of building an LLM is called reinforcement learning through human feedback, or RLHF. That's when people review the chatbot's responses and steer it toward good answers or away from bad ones. That significantly alters the tool's behavior and is one important mechanism for trying to stop abuse.

OpenAI's LLM is called GPT, which stands for "generative pretrained transformer." Training a new model is expensive and time consuming, typically taking weeks and requiring a data center packed with thousands of expensive AI acceleration processors. OpenAI's latest LLM is called GPT-4o. Other LLMs include Google's Gemini (formerly called Bard), Anthropic's Claude and Meta's Llama .

ChatGPT is an interface that lets you easily prompt GPT for responses. When it arrived as a free tool in November 2022, its use exploded far beyond what OpenAI expected.

When OpenAI launched ChatGPT, the company didn't even see it as a product. It was supposed to be a mere "research preview," a test that could draw some feedback from a broader audience, said ChatGPT product leader Nick Turley. Instead, it went viral, and OpenAI scrambled to just keep the service up and running under the demand.

"It was surreal," Turley said. "There was something about that release that just struck a nerve with folks in a way that we certainly did not expect. I remember distinctly coming back the day after we launched and looking at dashboards and thinking, something's broken, this couldn't be real, because we really didn't make a very big deal out of this launch."

ChatGPT, a name only engineers could love, was launched as a research project in November 2022, but quickly caught on as a consumer product.

How do I use ChatGPT?

The ChatGPT website is the most obvious method. Open it up, select the LLM version you want from the drop-down menu in the upper left corner, and type in a query.

As of April 1, OpenAI is allowing consumers to use ChatGPT without first signing up for an account. According to a blog post , the move was meant to make the tool more accessible. OpenAI also said in the post that as part of the move, it's introducing added content safeguards, blocking prompts in a wider range of categories.

However, users with accounts will be able to do more with the tool, such as save and review their history, share conversations and tap into features like voice conversations and custom instructions.

In 2023, OpenAI released a ChatGPT app for iPhones and for Android phones . In February 2024, ChatGPT for Apple Vision Pro arrived , too, adding the chatbot's abilities to the "spatial computing" headset. Be careful to look for the genuine article, because other developers can create their own chatbot apps that link to OpenAI's GPT.

In January 2024, OpenAI opened its GPT Store , a collection of custom AI apps that focus ChatGPT's all-purpose design to specific jobs. A lot more on that later, but in addition to finding them through the store you can invoke them with the @ symbol in a prompt, the way you might tag a friend on Instagram.

Microsoft uses GPT for its Bing search engine, which means you can also try out ChatGPT there.

ChatGPT has sprouted up in various hardware devices, including Volkswagen EVs , Humane's voice-controlled AI pin and the squarish Rabbit R1 device .

How much does ChatGPT cost?

It's free, though you have to set up an account to take advantage of all of its features.

For more capability, there's also a subscription called ChatGPT Plus that costs $20 per month that offers a variety of advantages: It responds faster, particularly during busy times when the free version is slow or sometimes tells you to try again later. It also offers access to newer AI models, including GPT-4 Turbo , which arrived in late 2023 with more up-to-date responses and an ability to ingest and output larger blocks of text.

The free ChatGPT uses GPT-4o, which launched in May of this year.

ChatGPT is growing beyond its language roots. With ChatGPT Plus, you can upload images, for example, to ask what type of mushroom is in a photo.

Perhaps most importantly, ChatGPT Plus lets you use GPTs.

What are these GPTs?

GPTs are custom versions of ChatGPT from OpenAI, its business partners and thousands of third-party developers who created their own GPTs.

Sometimes when people encounter ChatGPT, they don't know where to start. OpenAI calls it the "empty box problem." Discovering that led the company to find a way to narrow down the choices, Turley said.

"People really benefit from the packaging of a use case -- here's a very specific thing that I can do with ChatGPT," like travel planning, cooking help or an interactive, step-by-step tool to build a website, Turley said.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announces custom AI apps called GPTs at a developer event in November 2023.

Think of GPTs as OpenAI trying to make the general-purpose power of ChatGPT more refined the same way smartphones have a wealth of specific tools. (And think of GPTs as OpenAI's attempt to take control over how we find, use and pay for these apps, much like Apple has a commanding role over iPhones through its App Store.)

What GPTs are available now?

OpenAI's GPT store now offers millions of GPTs , though as with smartphone apps, you'll probably not be interested in most of them. A range of GPT custom apps are available, including AllTrails personal trail recommendations , a Khan Academy programming tutor , a Canva design tool , a book recommender , a fitness trainer , the laundry buddy clothes washing label decoder, a music theory instructor , a haiku writer and the Pearl for Pets for vet advice bot .

One person excited by GPTs is Daniel Kivatinos, co-founder of financial services company JustPaid . His team is building a GPT designed to take a spreadsheet of financial data as input and then let executives ask questions. How fast is a startup going through the money investors gave it? Why did that employee just file a $6,000 travel expense?

JustPaid hopes that GPTs will eventually be powerful enough to accept connections to bank accounts and financial software. For now, the developers are focusing on guardrails to avoid problems like hallucinations -- those answers that sound plausible but are actually wrong -- or making sure the GPT is answering based on the users' data, not on some general information in its AI model, Kivatinos said.

Anyone can create a GPT, at least in principle. OpenAI's GPT editor walks you through the process with a series of prompts. Just like with the regular ChatGPT, your ability to craft the right prompt will generate better results.

Another notable difference from regular ChatGPT: GPTs let you upload extra data that's relevant to your particular GPT, like a collection of essays or a writing style guide.

Some of the GPTs draw on OpenAI's Dall-E tool for turning text into images, which can be useful and entertaining. For example, there is a coloring book picture creator , a logo generator and a tool that turns text prompts into diagrams like company org charts. OpenAI calls Dall-E a GPT.

How up to date is ChatGPT?

Not very, and that can be a problem. For example, a Bing search using ChatGPT to process results said OpenAI hadn't yet released its ChatGPT Android app. Search results from traditional search engines can help to "ground" AI results, and indeed that's part of the Microsoft-OpenAI partnership that can tweak ChatGPT Plus results.

GPT-4 Turbo is trained on data up through April 2023. But it's nothing like a search engine whose bots crawl news sites many times a day for the latest information.

Can you trust ChatGPT responses?

No. Well, sometimes, but you need to be wary.

Large language models work by stringing words together, one after another, based on what's probable each step of the way. But it turns out that the generative AI fueled by LLMs works better and sounds more natural with a little spice of randomness added to the word selection recipe. That's the basic statistical nature that underlies the criticism that LLMs are mere "stochastic parrots" rather than sophisticated systems that in some way understand the world's complexity.

The result of this system, combined with the steering influence of the human training, is an AI that produces results that sound plausible but that aren't necessarily true. ChatGPT does better with information that's well represented in training data and undisputed -- for instance, red traffic signals mean stop, Plato was a philosopher who wrote the Allegory of the Cave , an Alaskan earthquake in 1964 was the largest in US history at magnitude 9.2.

We humans interact with AI chatbots by writing prompts -- questions or statements that seek an answer from the information stored in the chatbot's underlying large language model. 

When facts are more sparsely documented, controversial or off the beaten track of human knowledge, LLMs don't work as well. Unfortunately, they sometimes produce incorrect answers with a convincing, authoritative voice. That's what tripped up a lawyer who used ChatGPT to bolster his legal case only to be reprimanded when it emerged ChatGPT fabricated some cases that appeared to support his arguments. "I did not comprehend that ChatGPT could fabricate cases ," he said, according to The New York Times.

Such fabrications are called hallucinations in the AI business.

That means when you're using ChatGPT, it's best to double check facts elsewhere.

But there are plenty of creative uses for ChatGPT that don't require strictly factual results.

Want to use ChatGPT to draft a cover letter for a job hunt or give you ideas for a themed birthday party? No problem. Looking for hotel suggestions in Bangladesh? ChatGPT can give useful travel itineraries , but confirm the results before booking anything.

Is the hallucination problem getting better?

Yes, but we haven't seen a breakthrough.

"Hallucinations are a fundamental limitation of the way that these models work today," Turley said. LLMs just predict the next word in a response, over and over, "which means that they return things that are likely to be true, which is not always the same as things that are true," Turley said.

But OpenAI has been making gradual progress. "With nearly every model update, we've gotten a little bit better on making the model both more factual and more self aware about what it does and doesn't know," Turley said. "If you compare ChatGPT now to the original ChatGPT, it's much better at saying, 'I don't know that' or 'I can't help you with that' versus making something up."

Hallucinations are so much a part of the zeitgeist that Dictionary.com touted it as a new word it added to its dictionary in 2023.

Can you use ChatGPT for wicked purposes?

You can try, but lots of it will violate OpenAI's terms of use , and the company tries to block it too. The company prohibits use that involves sexual or violent material, racist caricatures, and personal information like Social Security numbers or addresses.

OpenAI works hard to prevent harmful uses. Indeed, its basic sales pitch is trying to bring the benefits of AI to the world without the drawbacks. But it acknowledges the difficulties, for example in its GPT-4 "system card" that documents its safety work.

"GPT-4 can generate potentially harmful content, such as advice on planning attacks or hate speech. It can represent various societal biases and worldviews that may not be representative of the user's intent, or of widely shared values. It can also generate code that is compromised or vulnerable," the system card says. It also can be used to try to identify individuals and could help lower the cost of cyberattacks.

Through a process called red teaming, in which experts try to find unsafe uses of its AI and bypass protections, OpenAI identified lots of problems and tried to nip them in the bud before GPT-4 launched. For example, a prompt to generate jokes mocking a Muslim boyfriend in a wheelchair was diverted so its response said, "I cannot provide jokes that may offend someone based on their religion, disability or any other personal factors. However, I'd be happy to help you come up with some light-hearted and friendly jokes that can bring laughter to the event without hurting anyone's feelings."

Researchers are still probing LLM limits. For example, Italian researchers discovered they could use ChatGPT to fabricate fake but convincing medical research data . And Google DeepMind researchers found that telling ChatGPT to repeat the same word forever eventually caused a glitch that made the chatbot blurt out training data verbatim. That's a big no-no, and OpenAI barred the approach .

LLMs are still new. Expect more problems and more patches.

And there are plenty of uses for ChatGPT that might be allowed but ill-advised. The website of Philadelphia's sheriff published more than 30 bogus news stories generated with ChatGPT .

What about ChatGPT and cheating in school?

ChatGPT is well suited to short essays on just about anything you might encounter in high school or college, to the chagrin of many educators who fear students will type in prompts instead of thinking for themselves.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella touted his company's partnership with OpenAI at a November 2023 event for OpenAI developers. Microsoft uses OpenAI's GPT large language model for its Bing search engine, Office productivity tools and GitHub Copilot programming assistant.

ChatGPT also can solve some math problems, explain physics phenomena, write chemistry lab reports and handle all kinds of other work students are supposed to handle on their own. Companies that sell anti-plagiarism software have pivoted to flagging text they believe an AI generated.

But not everyone is opposed, seeing it more like a tool akin to Google search and Wikipedia articles that can help students.

"There was a time when using calculators on exams was a huge no-no," said Alexis Abramson, dean of Dartmouth's Thayer School of Engineering. "It's really important that our students learn how to use these tools, because 90% of them are going into jobs where they're going to be expected to use these tools. They're going to walk in the office and people will expect them, being age 22 and technologically savvy, to be able to use these tools."

ChatGPT also can help kids get past writer's block and can help kids who aren't as good at writing, perhaps because English isn't their first language, she said.

So for Abramson, using ChatGPT to write a first draft or polish their grammar is fine. But she asks her students to disclose that fact.

"Anytime you use it, I would like you to include what you did when you turn in your assignment," she said. "It's unavoidable that students will use ChatGPT, so why don't we figure out a way to help them use it responsibly?"

Is ChatGPT coming for my job?

The threat to employment is real as managers seek to replace expensive humans with cheaper automated processes. We've seen this movie before: elevator operators were replaced by buttons, bookkeepers were replaced by accounting software, welders were replaced by robots. 

ChatGPT has all sorts of potential to blitz white-collar jobs: paralegals summarizing documents, marketers writing promotional materials, tax advisers interpreting IRS rules, even therapists offering relationship advice.

But so far, in part because of problems with things like hallucinations, AI companies present their bots as assistants and "copilots," not replacements.

And so far, sentiment is more positive than negative about chatbots, according to a survey by consulting firm PwC. Of 53,912 people surveyed around the world, 52% expressed at least one good expectation about the arrival of AI, for example that AI would increase their productivity. That compares with 35% who had at least one negative thing to say, for example that AI will replace them or require skills they're not confident they can learn.

How will ChatGPT affect programmers?

Software development is a particular area where people have found ChatGPT and its rivals useful. Trained on millions of lines of code, it internalized enough information to build websites and mobile apps. It can help programmers frame up bigger projects or fill in details.

One of the biggest fans is Microsoft's GitHub , a site where developers can host projects and invite collaboration. Nearly a third of people maintaining GitHub projects use its GPT-based assistant, called Copilot, and 92% of US developers say they're using AI tools .

"We call it the industrial revolution of software development," said Github Chief Product Officer Inbal Shani. "We see it lowering the barrier for entry. People who are not developers today can write software and develop applications using Copilot."

It's the next step in making programming more accessible, she said. Programmers used to have to understand bits and bytes, then higher-level languages gradually eased the difficulties. "Now you can write coding the way you talk to people," she said.

And AI programming aids still have a lot to prove. Researchers from Stanford and the University of California-San Diego found in a  study of 47 programmers  that those with access to an OpenAI programming help " wrote significantly less secure code  than those without access."

And they raise a variation of the cheating problem that some teachers are worried about: copying software that shouldn't be copied, which can lead to copyright problems. That's why Copyleaks, a maker of plagiarism detection software, offers a tool called the  Codeleaks Source Code AI Detector  designed to spot AI-generated code from ChatGPT, Google Gemini and GitHub Copilot. AIs could inadvertently copy code from other sources, and the latest version is designed to spot copied code based on its semantic structures, not just verbatim software.

At least in the next five years, Shani doesn't see AI tools like Copilot as taking humans out of programming.

"I don't think that it will replace the human in the loop. There's some capabilities that we as humanity have -- the creative thinking, the innovation, the ability to think beyond how a machine thinks in terms of putting things together in a creative way. That's something that the machine can still not do."

CNET's Lisa Lacy contributed to this report.

Computing Guides

• Best Laptop
• Best Chromebook
• Best Budget Laptop
• Best Cheap Gaming Laptop
• Best 2-in-1 Laptop
• Best Windows Laptop
• Best Macbook
• Best Gaming Laptop
• Best Macbook Deals
• Best Desktop PC
• Best Gaming PC
• Best Monitor Under 200
• Best Desktop Deals
• Best Monitors
• M2 Mac Mini Review
• Best PC Speakers
• Best Printer
• Best External Hard Drive SSD
• Best USB C Hub Docking Station
• Best Keyboard
• Best Webcams
• Best Laptop Backpack
• Best Camera to Buy
• Best Vlogging Camera
• Best Tripod
• Best Waterproof Camera
• Best Action Camera
• Best Camera Bag and Backpack
• Best E-Ink Tablets
• Best iPad Deals
• Best E-Reader
• Best Tablet
• Best Android Tablet
• Best 3D Printer
• Best Budget 3D Printer
• Best 3D Printing Filament
• Best 3D Printer Deals

• Share full article

Advertisement

Supported by

Guest Essay

ChatGPT vs. Me: Who Will Write a Better Beach Read?

By Curtis Sittenfeld

Ms. Sittenfeld is the author of the novel “Romantic Comedy” and the forthcoming story collection “Show Don’t Tell.”

What makes a beach read a beach read? Is it an escapist subject matter? A frothy tone? Or is any book you read on a beach automatically a beach read?

I’m the author of seven novels and one short-story collection, and I have no idea what the answer is to these questions. But in an attempt to figure them out, I’ve agreed to participate in an experiment, and I hope you’ll join me.

I’ve put together a list of some of my favorite elements of summer along with other topics I like to write about. Please vote on which items you would most want included in a summery short story — your ideal beach read — and submit your own suggestion, too. I’ll then write a story that includes the top three vote-getters and two elements I choose from readers. And because it’s 2024 and life is now weird all the time, so will ChatGPT. Which will help us answer another pressing question: What’s the difference between human and machine writing?

Both stories will be the same length (1,000 words) and both will incorporate the same five prompts. ChatGPT, which will be told to write in my style, will complete its story in a few seconds; I’ll complete mine in a few weeks.

I’m curious about whether, in its current iteration, ChatGPT can write fiction I’d want to read or aspire to write. Can it write like me specifically? What does writing like me even mean? I’m one of the many fiction writers whose novels were used, without my permission and without compensation, to train ChatGPT. (I confess that I was offended in one way that five of my books had been used and offended in a different way that two of them — the two that sold the least and received the worst reviews — hadn’t.) Groups of fiction writers have sued OpenAI, which developed ChatGPT, for copyright infringement. The New York Times has sued Microsoft and OpenAI over the use of copyrighted work.

So it may go without saying that in this contest, I’m rooting for myself — I’m Team Human, and I’m hoping to honorably defend my species. But as with the steel-driving John Henry and the chess-playing Garry Kasparov before me, the outcome is unknown in advance. Maybe fiction writers’ jobs are in danger, or maybe there’s some ineffable quality, similar to the transcendent quality of a beach read, that still separates a story told by a person from a story told by a computer.

Beach Read Ingredients (Take Your Pick):

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and  log into  your Times account, or  subscribe  for all of The Times.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access.

Already a subscriber?  Log in .

Want all of The Times?  Subscribe .

• Open access
• Published: 09 July 2024

Exploring the potential of artificial intelligence to enhance the writing of english academic papers by non-native english-speaking medical students - the educational application of ChatGPT

• Jiakun Li 1   na1 ,
• Hui Zong 1   na1 ,
• Erman Wu 1 , 4   na1 ,
• Rongrong Wu 1 ,
• Zhufeng Peng 1 ,
• Jing Zhao 1 ,
• Lu Yang 1 ,
• Hong Xie 2 &
• Bairong Shen 1 , 3  

BMC Medical Education volume  24 , Article number:  736 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

Metrics details

Academic paper writing holds significant importance in the education of medical students, and poses a clear challenge for those whose first language is not English. This study aims to investigate the effectiveness of employing large language models, particularly ChatGPT, in improving the English academic writing skills of these students.

A cohort of 25 third-year medical students from China was recruited. The study consisted of two stages. Firstly, the students were asked to write a mini paper. Secondly, the students were asked to revise the mini paper using ChatGPT within two weeks. The evaluation of the mini papers focused on three key dimensions, including structure, logic, and language. The evaluation method incorporated both manual scoring and AI scoring utilizing the ChatGPT-3.5 and ChatGPT-4 models. Additionally, we employed a questionnaire to gather feedback on students’ experience in using ChatGPT.

After implementing ChatGPT for writing assistance, there was a notable increase in manual scoring by 4.23 points. Similarly, AI scoring based on the ChatGPT-3.5 model showed an increase of 4.82 points, while the ChatGPT-4 model showed an increase of 3.84 points. These results highlight the potential of large language models in supporting academic writing. Statistical analysis revealed no significant difference between manual scoring and ChatGPT-4 scoring, indicating the potential of ChatGPT-4 to assist teachers in the grading process. Feedback from the questionnaire indicated a generally positive response from students, with 92% acknowledging an improvement in the quality of their writing, 84% noting advancements in their language skills, and 76% recognizing the contribution of ChatGPT in supporting academic research.

The study highlighted the efficacy of large language models like ChatGPT in augmenting the English academic writing proficiency of non-native speakers in medical education. Furthermore, it illustrated the potential of these models to make a contribution to the educational evaluation process, particularly in environments where English is not the primary language.

Peer Review reports

Introduction

Large language models (LLMs) are artificial intelligence (AI) tools that have remarkable ability to understand and generate text [ 1 , 2 ]. Trained with substantial amounts of textual data, LLMs have demonstrated their capability to perform diverse tasks, such as question answering, machine translation, and writing [ 3 , 4 ]. In 2022, Open AI released a LLM called ChatGPT [ 5 ]. Since its inception, ChatGPT has been widely applied in medicine domain, especially after testing, it can demonstrate the medical level that meets the requirements of passing the United States Medical Licensing Exam [ 6 ]. It can provide personalized learning experience according to the preference style of medical students [ 7 ]. Research has shown that the explanations provided by ChatGPT are more accurate and comprehensive than the explanations of basic principles provided in some standardized higher education exams [ 8 ]. Therefore, many researchers believe that ChatGPT may improve students’ problem-solving ability and reflective learning [ 9 ].

Writing English language based academic papers is very important for the development of medical students in universities. China is a non-native English-speaking country with a large population of medical students, so it is necessary to provide medical education and offer relevant courses, especially to cultivate their ability to write English academic papers [ 10 ]. This is essential for future engagement in scientific research and clinical work within the field of medicine. However, the ability of these non-native English-speaking medical students in writing English papers is relatively limited, and they need continuous training and improvement [ 11 ].

LLMs can be used to generate and modify text content and language styles, and can be applied to the quality improvement of scientific papers [ 12 , 13 ]. ChatGPT exhibits considerable potential in medical paper writing, assist in literature retrieval, data analysis, knowledge synthesis and other aspects [ 14 ]. Students received AI-assisted instruction exhibited improved proficiency in multiple aspects of writing, organization, coherence, grammar, and vocabulary [ 15 ]. Additionally, AI mediated instruction can positively impacts English learning achievement and self-regulated learning [ 16 ]. LLMs can also perform language translation [ 13 , 17 ]. Moreover, it can automatically evaluate and score the level of medical writing, and provide modification suggestions for improvement [ 18 ]. These studies indicate that incorporating large language models like ChatGPT into medical education holds promise for various advantages. However, their usage must be accompanied by careful and critical evaluation [ 19 ]. As far as we know, there is currently no research to evaluate the usability and effectiveness of ChatGPT in medical mini paper writing courses through real classroom teaching scenarios.

Therefore, in this study, we introduce the ChatGPT into real-world medical courses to investigate the effectiveness of employing LLMs in improving the academic writing proficiency for non-native English-speaking medical students. By collecting and analyzing data, we aim to provide evidence of the effectiveness of employing a LLM in improving the English academic writing skills of medical students, thereby facilitating better medical education and improve the scientific research ability and writing skills for students.

Participants

The research included 27 third-year medical students from the West China School of Medicine at Sichuan University. These students are all non-native English speakers. These students had concluded their fundamental medical coursework but had not yet embarked on specialized subjects. Exclusion criteria were applied to those who failed to fulfill the requisite homework assignments.

Initial Stage: The task involved composing an English academic paper in accordance with the stipulations of English thesis education. Considering the students’ junior academic standing, the composition of a discussion section in paper was not mandated. Each student was tasked with authoring a concise, “mini paper.”

Experimental Phase: Upon the completion of their individual “mini papers,” students had initially submitted these under the label “group without ChatGPT.” Subsequently, they engaged with ChatGPT-3.5 for a period of two weeks to refine their English academic manuscripts. After this period, the revised mini papers were resubmitted under the designation “group with ChatGPT.” Alongside this resubmission, students also provided a questionnaire regarding their experience with ChatGPT. The questionnaire was administered in Mandarin, which is the commonly used language in the research context. We conducted a thorough discussion within our teaching and research group to develop the questionnaire. Two students, who failed to meet the stipulated submission deadline, were excluded from the study.

All mini papers underwent evaluation and scoring based on a standardized scoring criterion. The assessment process encompassed three distinct approaches. Firstly, two teachers independently scored each mini paper using a blind review technique, and the final score was determined by averaging the two assessments. Secondly, scoring was performed using ChatGPT-3.5. Lastly, scoring was conducted using ChatGPT-4.

Evaluation Criteria: The scoring was composed of three dimensions: structure, logic, and language, with each dimension carrying a maximum of 20 points, culminating in a total of 60 points. The scores for each section were categorized into four tiers: 0–5 points (Fail), 6–10 points (Below Average), 11–15 points (Good), and 16–20 points (Excellent). The minimum unit for deduction was 0.5 points.

Structure emphasizes the organization and arrangement of the paper. It ensures that the content is placed in the appropriate sections according to the guidelines commonly found in academic journals. Logic refers to the coherence and progression of ideas within the paper. The logical flow should be evident, with each section building upon the previous ones to provide a cohesive argument. A strong logical framework ensures a systematic and well-supported study. Language refers to the correctness and proficiency of English writing. Proper language expression is essential for effectively conveying ideas and ensuring clear communication, and makes the paper becomes more readable and comprehensible to the intended audience.

Experience questionnaire for ChatGPT: The questionnaire comprised 31 questions, detailed in the attached appendix. (Attachment document)

Data analysis

The Kruskal-Wallis rank sum test was utilized to assess the baseline scores of students before and after using ChatGPT. A paired t-test was utilized to analyze the impact of ChatGPT on the improvement of students’ assignment quality (manual grading). Univariate regression analysis was conducted to investigate the extent of improvement in assignment quality attributed to ChatGPT. Previous studies have shown discrepancies in language learning and language-related skills between males and females. In order to mitigate any potential biases, we implemented gender correction techniques, which encompassed statistical adjustments to accommodate these gender variations [ 20 , 21 , 22 ]. The questionnaire was distributed and collected using the Wenjuanxing platform (Changsha Ran Xing Science and Technology, Shanghai, China. [ https://www.wjx.cn ]).

Statistical analyses were performed using the R software package (version 4.2.0, The R Foundation, Boston, MA, USA), Graph Pad Prism 9 (GraphPad Software, CA, USA), and Empower (X&Y Solutions Inc., Boston, MA, USA) [ 23 ].

Manual scoring

Ultimately, the study included 25 participants, with two students being excluded due to late submission of their assignments. These participants were all third-year undergraduate students, including 14 males (56%) and 11 females (44%). The “group without ChatGPT” consisted of 25 participants who wrote mini papers with an average word count of 1410.56 ± 265.32, cited an average of 16.44 ± 8.31 references, and received a manual score of 46.45 ± 3.59. In contrast, the “group with ChatGPT” of 25 participants produced mini papers with an average word count of 1406.52 ± 349.59, cited 16.80 ± 8.10 references on average, and achieved a manual score of 50.68 ± 2.03. Further details are available in Table  1 .

In terms of manual scoring, medical students demonstrated a significant improvement in the quality of their assignments in the dimensions of logic, structure, language, and overall score after using ChatGPT, as depicted in Fig.  1 .

Using ChatGPT improved the quality of students’ academic papers. A statistical analysis of the manual scoring showed that the quality of students’ academic papers improved after using ChatGPT for revision in terms of structure, logic, language, and overall score. The results showed statistical significance. *** p  < 0.001, **** p  < 0.0001

We also conducted a univariate analysis on the impact of ChatGPT on medical students’ academic papers writing across all scoring methods. The results indicated significant improvement in all manual scores and those evaluated by ChatGPT-3.5 for paper structure, logic, language, and total score (all p  < 0.05). Papers assessed by ChatGPT-4 also showed significant improvements in structure, logic, and total score (all p  < 0.05). Although the language scores of papers evaluated by ChatGPT-4 did not show a significant difference, a trend of improvement was observed (β 1.02, 95% confidence interval (CI) -0.15, 2.19, p  = 0.1). After adjusting for gender, multivariate regression analysis yielded similar results, with significant improvements in all dimensions of scoring across all methods, except for the language scores evaluated by ChatGPT-4. The total manual scoring of students’ papers improved by 4.23 (95% CI 2.64, 5.82) after revisions with ChatGPT, ChatGPT-3.5 scores increased by 4.82 (95% CI 2.47, 7.17), and ChatGPT-4 scores by 3.84 (95% CI 0.83, 6.85). Further details are presented in Table  2 .

The potential of ChatGPT in scoring support

Additionally, we investigated whether ChatGPT could assist teachers in assignment assessment. The results showed significant differences between the scores given by the ChatGPT-3.5 and manual grading, both for groups with and without ChatGPT. Interestingly, the scores from ChatGPT-4 were not significantly different from human grading, which suggests that ChatGPT-4 may have the potential to assist teachers in reviewing and grading student assignments (Fig.  2 ).

Potential of ChatGPT assisting teachers in evaluating papers. The results showed that there was a significant statistical difference between the scoring results of the GPT3.5 and the manual scoring results, both for the unrevised mini papers (left) and the revised mini papers (right) using ChatGPT. However, there was no significant statistical difference between the scoring results of GPT4 and the manual scoring results, which mean that GPT4 might be able to replace teachers in scoring in the future. ns: no significance, *** p  < 0.001, **** p  < 0.0001

Experience questionnaire

Among the 25 valid questionnaires, social media emerged as the primary channel through which participants became aware of ChatGPT, accounting for 84% of responses. This was followed by recommendations from acquaintances and requirements from schools/offices, each selected by 48% of participants. News media accounted for 44%. (Attachment document)

Regarding the purpose of using ChatGPT (multiple responses allowed), 92% used it mainly to enhance homework quality and improve writing efficiency. 68% utilized ChatGPT for knowledge gathering. 56% employed ChatGPT primarily to improve their language skills. (Attachment document)

In the course of the study, the most widely used feature of ChatGPT in assisting with academic paper writing was English polishing, chosen by 100% of the students, indicating its widespread use for improving the language quality of their papers. Generating outlines and format editing were also popular choices, with 64% and 60% using these features, respectively. (Attachment document)

When asked what they would use ChatGPT for, 92% of participants considered it as a language learning tool for real-time translation and grammar correction. 84% viewed ChatGPT as a tool for assisting in paper writing, providing literature materials and writing suggestions. 76% saw ChatGPT as a valuable tool for academic research and literature review. 48% believed that ChatGPT could serve as a virtual tutor, providing personalized learning advice and guidance. (Attachment document)

Regarding attitudes towards the role of ChatGPT in medical education, 24% of participants had an optimistic view, actively embracing its role, while 52% had a generally positive attitude, and 24% held a neutral stance. This indicates that most participants viewed the role of ChatGPT in medical education positively, with only a minority being pessimistic. (Attachment document)

Among the participants, when asked about the limitations of ChatGPT in medical education, 96% acknowledged the challenge in verifying the authenticity of information; 72% noted a lack of human-like creative thinking; 52% pointed out the absence of clinical practice insights; and 40% identified language and cultural differences as potential issues. (Attachment document)

The results from the participants’ two-week unrestricted usage of the AI model ChatGPT to enhance their assignments indicated a noticeable improvement in the quality of student papers. This suggests that large language models could serve as assistive tools in medical education by potentially improving the English writing skills of medical students. Furthermore, the results of comparative analysis revealed that the ChatGPT-4 model’s evaluations showed no statistical difference from teacher’s manual grading. Therefore, AI might have prospective applications in certain aspects of teaching, such as grading assessments, providing significant assistance to manual efforts.

The results of questionnaire indicate ChatGPT can serve as an important educational tool, beneficial in a range of teaching contexts, including online classroom Q&A assistant, virtual tutor and facilitating language learning [ 24 ]. ChatGPT’s expansive knowledge base and advanced natural language processing capability enable it to effectively answer students’ inquiries and offer valuable literature resources and writing advice [ 25 ]. For language learning, it offers real-time translation and grammar correction, aiding learners in improving their language skills through evaluation and feedback [ 26 ]. ChatGPT can also deliver personalized educational guidance based on individual student needs, enhancing adaptive learning strategies [ 27 ]. Furthermore, in this study, the positive feedback of questionnaire for the usage of ChatGPT in English language polishing of academic papers, as well as for generating paper outlines and formatting, underscores its acceptance and recognition among students. The evaluation results of three dimensions reflects a keen focus on enhancing the structural and formatting quality of their papers, demonstrating the large AI language model’s impressive teaching efficacy in undergraduate education.

In the questionnaire assessing ChatGPT’s accuracy and quality, 48% of respondents indicated satisfaction with its performance. However, it’s important to consider that the quality and accuracy of responses from any AI model, including ChatGPT, can be influenced by various factors such as the source of data, model design, and training data quality. These results, while indicative, require deeper research and analysis to fully understand the capabilities and limitations of ChatGPT in this field. Furthermore, ongoing discussions about ethics and data security in AI applications highlight the need for continued vigilance and improvement [ 28 ]. Overall, while ChatGPT shows promise in medical education, it is clear that it has limitations that must be addressed to better serve the needs of this specialized field.

Manual grading can be a time-consuming task for teachers, particularly when dealing with a large number of assignments or exams. ChatGPT-4 may provide support to teachers in the grading process, which could free up their time, allowing them to focus on other aspects of teaching, such as providing personalized feedback or engaging with students. However, it may not replace the role of teachers in grading. Teachers possess valuable expertise and contextual knowledge that go beyond simple evaluation of assignments. They consider factors such as student effort, creativity, critical thinking, and the ability to convey ideas effectively. These aspects might be challenging for an AI model to fully capture and evaluate. Furthermore, the use of AI in grading raises important ethical considerations. It is crucial to ensure that the model’s grading criteria align with educational standards and are fair and unbiased.

Despite its potential benefits of using ChatGPT in medical education, it also has limitations, such as language barriers and cultural differences [ 29 , 30 ]. When inputted with different languages, ChatGPT may have difficulty in understanding and generating accurate responses. Medical terms and concepts vary across different languages, and even slight differences in translation can lead to misunderstandings. Medical education is also influenced by cultural factors. Different cultures have different communication styles, which can impact the way medical information is exchanged. Recognizing and respecting the diversity of cultural perspectives is crucial for providing patient-centered care, and it should be an important part in medical education, which ChatGPT does not excel at. The model may struggle with translating non-English languages, impacting its effectiveness in a global medical education context. Additionally, while ChatGPT can generate a vast amount of text, it lacks the creative thinking and contextual understanding inherent to human cognition, which can be crucial in medical education. Another concern is the authenticity and credibility of the information generated by ChatGPT [ 31 , 32 ]. In medical education, where accuracy and reliability of knowledge are paramount, the inability to guarantee the truthfulness of the information poses a significant challenge [ 32 , 33 , 34 ].

These limitations of ChatGPT in medical education may be addressed and potentially rectified with updates and advancements in AI models. For instance, in this study, the scoring results showed no statistical difference between the ChatGPT-4 model and manual grading, unlike the significant discrepancies observed with the ChatGPT-3.5 model. This suggests that ChatGPT-4 has improved capabilities to assist manual grading by teachers, demonstrating greater intelligence and human-like understanding compared to the ChatGPT-3.5 model. Similar findings have been noted in other research, highlighting the advancements from version 3.5 to 4. For example, there were clear evidences that version 4 achieved better test results than version 3.5 in professional knowledge exams in disciplines such as orthopedics [ 35 ], dermatology [ 36 ], and ophthalmology [ 37 ].

This study aimed to explore the use of ChatGPT in enhancing English writing skills among non-native English-speaking medical students. The results showed that the quality of students’ writing improved significantly after using ChatGPT, highlighting the potential of large language models in supporting academic writing by enhancing structure, logic, and language skills. Statistical analysis indicated that ChatGPT-4 has the potential to assist teachers in grading. As a pilot study in this field, it may pave the way for further research on the application of AI in medical education. This new approach of incorporating AI into English paper writing education for medical students represents an innovative research perspective. This study not only aligns with the evolving landscape of technology-enhanced learning but also addresses specific needs in medical education, particularly in the context of academic writing. In the future, AI models should be more rationally utilized to further enhance medical education and improve medical students’ research writing skills.

Data availability

The datasets used and/or analysed during the current study available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Singhal K, Azizi S, Tu T, Mahdavi SS, Wei J, Chung HW, Scales N, Tanwani A, Cole-Lewis H, Pfohl S, et al. Large language models encode clinical knowledge. Nature. 2023;620(7972):172–80.

Article   Google Scholar  

Tamkin A, Brundage M, Clark J, Ganguli D. Understanding the Capabilities, Limitations, and Societal Impact of Large Language Models. ArXiv 2021, abs/2102.02503.

Korngiebel DM, Mooney SD. Considering the possibilities and pitfalls of generative pre-trained transformer 3 (GPT-3) in healthcare delivery. NPJ Digit Med. 2021;4(1):93.

Zong H, Li J, Wu E, Wu R, Lu J, Shen B. Performance of ChatGPT on Chinese national medical licensing examinations: a five-year examination evaluation study for physicians, pharmacists and nurses. BMC Med Educ. 2024;24(1):143.

ChatGPT. Optimizing Language Models for Dialogue [ https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt/ ]

Kung TH, Cheatham M, Medenilla A, Sillos C, De Leon L, Elepano C, Madriaga M, Aggabao R, Diaz-Candido G, Maningo J, et al. Performance of ChatGPT on USMLE: potential for AI-assisted medical education using large language models. PLOS Digit Health. 2023;2(2):e0000198.

Sallam M. ChatGPT Utility in Healthcare Education, Research, and practice: systematic review on the promising perspectives and valid concerns. Healthc (Basel) 2023, 11(6).

Fijacko N, Gosak L, Stiglic G, Picard CT, John Douma M. Can ChatGPT pass the life support exams without entering the American heart association course? Resuscitation 2023, 185:109732.

Gilson A, Safranek CW, Huang T, Socrates V, Chi L, Taylor RA, Chartash D. How does ChatGPT perform on the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE)? The implications of Large Language Models for Medical Education and Knowledge Assessment. JMIR Med Educ. 2023;9:e45312.

Wang W. Medical education in China: progress in the past 70 years and a vision for the future. BMC Med Educ. 2021;21(1):453.

Wu C, Zhang YW, Li AW. Peer feedback and Chinese medical students’ English academic writing development: a longitudinal intervention study. BMC Med Educ. 2023;23(1):578.

Luo R, Sun L, Xia Y, Qin T, Zhang S, Poon H, Liu TY. BioGPT: generative pre-trained transformer for biomedical text generation and mining. Brief Bioinform 2022, 23(6).

Biswas S. ChatGPT and the future of Medical writing. Radiology. 2023;307(2):e223312.

Li J, Tang T, Wu E, Zhao J, Zong H, Wu R, Feng W, Zhang K, Wang D, Qin Y et al. RARPKB: a knowledge-guide decision support platform for personalized robot-assisted surgery in prostate cancer. Int J Surg 2024.

Song C, Song Y. Enhancing academic writing skills and motivation: assessing the efficacy of ChatGPT in AI-assisted language learning for EFL students. Front Psychol. 2023;14:1260843.

Wei L. Artificial intelligence in language instruction: impact on English learning achievement, L2 motivation, and self-regulated learning. Front Psychol. 2023;14:1261955.

Panayiotou A, Gardner A, Williams S, Zucchi E, Mascitti-Meuter M, Goh AM, You E, Chong TW, Logiudice D, Lin X, et al. Language Translation Apps in Health Care settings: Expert Opinion. JMIR Mhealth Uhealth. 2019;7(4):e11316.

Veras M, Dyer JO, Rooney M, Barros Silva PG, Rutherford D, Kairy D. Usability and efficacy of Artificial Intelligence Chatbots (ChatGPT) for Health sciences students: protocol for a crossover randomized controlled trial. JMIR Res Protoc. 2023;12:e51873.

Jeyaraman M, K SP, Jeyaraman N, Nallakumarasamy A, Yadav S, Bondili SK. ChatGPT in Medical Education and Research: a Boon or a bane? Cureus 2023, 15(8):e44316.

Saxena S, Wright WS, Khalil MK. Gender differences in learning and study strategies impact medical students’ preclinical and USMLE step 1 examination performance. BMC Med Educ. 2024;24(1):504.

D’Lima GM, Winsler A, Kitsantas A. Ethnic and gender differences in first-year college students’ goal orientation, self-efficacy, and extrinsic and intrinsic motivation. J Educational Res. 2014;107(5):341–56.

Kusnierz C, Rogowska AM, Pavlova I. Examining gender differences, personality traits, academic performance, and motivation in Ukrainian and Polish students of Physical Education: a cross-cultural study. Int J Environ Res Public Health 2020, 17(16).

Empower, X&Y Solutions Inc. (, Boston MA) [ https://www.empowerstats.com ]

Futterer T, Fischer C, Alekseeva A, Chen X, Tate T, Warschauer M, Gerjets P. ChatGPT in education: global reactions to AI innovations. Sci Rep. 2023;13(1):15310.

Khan RA, Jawaid M, Khan AR, Sajjad M. ChatGPT - reshaping medical education and clinical management. Pak J Med Sci. 2023;39(2):605–7.

Deng J, Lin Y. The Benefits and Challenges of ChatGPT: An Overview. Frontiers in Computing and Intelligent Systems 2023.

Baidoo-Anu D, Owusu Ansah L. Education in the era of Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI): understanding the potential benefits of ChatGPT in promoting teaching and learning. SSRN Electron J 2023.

Preiksaitis C, Rose C. Opportunities, challenges, and Future Directions of Generative Artificial Intelligence in Medical Education: scoping review. JMIR Med Educ. 2023;9:e48785.

Albrecht UV, Behrends M, Schmeer R, Matthies HK, von Jan U. Usage of multilingual mobile translation applications in clinical settings. JMIR Mhealth Uhealth. 2013;1(1):e4.

Beh TH, Canty DJ. English and Mandarin translation using Google Translate software for pre-anaesthetic consultation. Anaesth Intensive Care. 2015;43(6):792–3.

Google Scholar  

Haleem A, Javaid M, Singh RP. An era of ChatGPT as a significant futuristic support tool: a study on features, abilities, and challenges. BenchCouncil Trans Benchmarks Stand Evaluations 2023.

Haque MU, Dharmadasa I, Sworna ZT, Rajapakse RN, Ahmad H. I think this is the most disruptive technology: Exploring Sentiments of ChatGPT Early Adopters using Twitter Data. ArXiv 2022, abs/2212.05856.

Cooper G. Examining Science Education in ChatGPT: an exploratory study of Generative Artificial Intelligence. J Sci Edu Technol. 2023;32:444–52.

Yu C, Zong H, Chen Y, Zhou Y, Liu X, Lin Y, Li J, Zheng X, Min H, Shen B. PCAO2: an ontology for integration of prostate cancer associated genotypic, phenotypic and lifestyle data. Brief Bioinform 2024, 25(3).

Massey PA, Montgomery C, Zhang AS. Comparison of ChatGPT-3.5, ChatGPT-4, and Orthopaedic Resident performance on Orthopaedic Assessment examinations. J Am Acad Orthop Surg. 2023;31(23):1173–9.

Lewandowski M, Lukowicz P, Swietlik D, Baranska-Rybak W. An original study of ChatGPT-3.5 and ChatGPT-4 dermatological knowledge level based on the Dermatology Specialty Certificate examinations. Clin Exp Dermatol; 2023.

Teebagy S, Colwell L, Wood E, Yaghy A, Faustina M. Improved performance of ChatGPT-4 on the OKAP examination: a comparative study with ChatGPT-3.5. J Acad Ophthalmol (2017). 2023;15(2):e184–7.

Download references

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully thank Dr. Changzhong Chen, Chi Chen, and Xin-Lin Chen (EmpowerStats X&Y Solutions, Inc., Boston, MA) for providing statistical methodology consultation.

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (32070671 and 32270690), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (2023SCU12057). The authors gratefully thank Dr. Changzhong Chen, Chi Chen, and Xin-Lin Chen (EmpowerStats X&Y Solutions, Inc., Boston, MA) for providing statistical methodology consultation.

Author information

Jiakun Li, Hui Zong and Erman Wu contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

Department of Urology and Institutes for Systems Genetics, Frontiers Science Center for Disease-related Molecular Network, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu, 610041, China

Jiakun Li, Hui Zong, Erman Wu, Rongrong Wu, Zhufeng Peng, Jing Zhao, Lu Yang & Bairong Shen

West China Hospital, West China School of Medicine, Sichuan University, No. 37, Guoxue Alley, Chengdu, 610041, China

Institutes for Systems Genetics, Frontiers Science Center for Disease-related Molecular Network, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu, 610041, China

Bairong Shen

Department of Neurosurgery, the First Affiliated Hospital of Xinjiang Medical University, Urumqi, 830054, China

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Contributions

J.L., H.Z. and E.W. contributed equally as first authors of this manuscript. J.L., H.X. and B.S. were responsible for the conception and design of this study. J.L., E.W., R.W., J.Z., L.Y. and Z.P. interpreted the data. J.L., E.W., H.Z. and L.Y. were responsible for the data acquisition. J.L., H.Z. and E.W. wrote the first draft, interpreted the data, and wrote the final version of the manuscript. J.Z. was committed to the language editing of the manuscript. All authors critically revised the manuscript for important intellectual content and approved the final version of the manuscript. H.X. and B.S. contributed equally as the corresponding authors of this manuscript. All authors have read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Hong Xie or Bairong Shen .

Ethics declarations

Ethic approval and consent to participate.

Was not required for this study because the research data were anonymised, and the Research Ethics Committee of West China Hospital of Sichuan University determined it was not necessary based on the study’s nature.

Consent for publication

Not applicable (NA).

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

AI use in the writing process

During the writing of this work the author(s) used generative AI and/or AI-assisted technologies for the purpose of English language polishing. The author(s) take responsibility for the content and intended meaning of this article.

Additional information

Publisher’s note.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Electronic supplementary material

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

Supplementary Material 1

Rights and permissions.

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver ( http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article.

Li, J., Zong, H., Wu, E. et al. Exploring the potential of artificial intelligence to enhance the writing of english academic papers by non-native english-speaking medical students - the educational application of ChatGPT. BMC Med Educ 24 , 736 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-024-05738-y

Download citation

Received : 04 April 2024

Accepted : 02 July 2024

Published : 09 July 2024

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-024-05738-y

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Large language model
• Medical education
• Medical english
• Academic writing

BMC Medical Education

ISSN: 1472-6920

• Submission enquiries: [email protected]
• General enquiries: [email protected]

•  Login

Copyright © 2024 ContentDetector.AI

AI Detector | The AI Content Detector | ChatGPT & AI Checker

Type of paste text here (above 250 words for better accuracy) or try out some examples: Human | AI . Currently detection is available only in English.

Word Count: 0

Character Count: 0

How Artificial is Your Content

Probability Score

| About AI Detector |

The AI Detector is designed to detect any AI-generated content. The AI Detector provides a probability score based on the likelihood that the text content was generated by AI tools or chatbots.

Thousands of users love our app, and since its launch, more than a million bloggers and academics have used our tool to identify AI-generated text. It is powered by Content at Scale’s AI Detector .

ChatGPT Detector and Plagiarism Checker

ChatGPT is the most popular AI Content generator out there which uses GPT 3.5 and GPT 4 models. AI Detector can accurately detect Chat GPT-generated content with an accuracy of up to 85%. This ChatGPT Checker can detect both GPT 3.5 and GPT 4 generated content. It is a free Chat GPT Detector and ChatGPT plagiarism checker  without any limitations whatsoever.

The AI Detector.

The AI Detector is not only easy to use but also has a lot of functionality. The AI Content Detector goes beyond a simple AI Checker or Plagiarism Checker, it is also a word counter, and character counter. You just need to copy and paste the content into the text field for the detailed analysis. With the AI Detector, you can ensure authenticity and originality of all your content.

Why our AI Content Detector

Testimonials

★ ★ ★ ★ ★.

ContentDetector.ai has been a game-changer for my workflow. As a content creator, ensuring the originality of my work is crucial. This tool provides accurate and quick detection of AI-generated text, giving me peace of mind that my content is authentic. Highly recommend it to anyone serious about content quality.

John Davis, Content Creator

Using ContentDetector.ai has significantly improved our content review process. It’s incredibly easy to use and provides detailed reports that help us identify and address AI-generated content swiftly. The added functionalities like word and character counters are a bonus. A must-have tool for any digital marketing team!

Lisa Michaels, Digital Marketer

For my blog, this tool has been an invaluable resource. It is simple to use, and by alerting me to instances of AI-generated content that my authors have created, it has already helped me improve the overall quality of my material.

Alissa Peterson, Educator

How the ai detector works.

This detection model was developed by combining and fine-tuning the results of Open AI’s GPT 2 model with the outputs of a robustly optimized BERT pretraining approach (Roberta) model. Please note that any detector algorithm works on probability and are not 100% accurate. Hence, users need to utilize this tool along with their judgment to determine whether the content was created by Humans or AI/Chat GPT.

Here is the demo youtube video on how to use our website

Will Google Penalize AI Content?

Google will not penalize content simply because AI generates it. However, the search engine giant has made it clear that it prioritizes high-quality content that provides value to users. If AI-generated content fails to meet these criteria, it may not rank well in search results

As such, it’s essential to ensure that AI-generated content is well-written, informative, and adds value to users. If the content is helpful and meets Google’s guidelines for helpful content , there should be no penalty from Google.

The AI Content Detector for Bloggers.

With the AI Detector, enhancing your blog writing has never been so easy. AI Detector is essential for bloggers who aim to produce the best high quality, plagiarism-free, and optimized content that they can.

Any spam content can violate their criteria; in fact, Google has published two helpful content upgrades this year that specifically target spam content. However, AI-written content may or may not constitute spam, depending on how the AI tool was utilized.

The AI Detector and Academics

Academicians and universities may utilize the tool to determine whether the essays provided by students are legitimate. Simply copy and paste the material into the text field and click on “analyze” to identify any bogus information. This may be a useful free educational tool, particularly for teachers.

ContentDetector.AI vs Other AI Content Detector tools

AI Detector is a tool that stands out in the market, offering a unique combination of AI detection and word-counting features in a user-friendly package. The AI Detector presents the detection results in a clear and visually appealing percentage form without any character limit restrictions.

You can just copy and paste the Chat GPT generated content into the text box on the home page of ContentDetector.AI and click on the analyze button. This ChatGPT detector will provide a probability score in a few seconds.

ChatGPT works on GPT 3.5 and GPT 4. Even if GPT 3.5 and GPT 4 are the next versions of generative AI technology, ContentDetector.AI detects the ChatGPT-generated content with reasonable accuracy.

ContentDetector.AI can check chatbot responses for plagiarism by comparing them to its vast training datasets. It provides an estimated percentage score for the likelihood of copied content, helping ChatGPT users to avoid intellectual property issues. However, as of now, it cannot detect traditional plagiarism, we will soon be adding general plagiarism as well.

For IEEE Members

Ieee spectrum, follow ieee spectrum, support ieee spectrum, enjoy more free content and benefits by creating an account, saving articles to read later requires an ieee spectrum account, the institute content is only available for members, downloading full pdf issues is exclusive for ieee members, downloading this e-book is exclusive for ieee members, access to spectrum 's digital edition is exclusive for ieee members, following topics is a feature exclusive for ieee members, adding your response to an article requires an ieee spectrum account, create an account to access more content and features on ieee spectrum , including the ability to save articles to read later, download spectrum collections, and participate in conversations with readers and editors. for more exclusive content and features, consider joining ieee ., join the world’s largest professional organization devoted to engineering and applied sciences and get access to all of spectrum’s articles, archives, pdf downloads, and other benefits. learn more about ieee →, join the world’s largest professional organization devoted to engineering and applied sciences and get access to this e-book plus all of ieee spectrum’s articles, archives, pdf downloads, and other benefits. learn more about ieee →, access thousands of articles — completely free, create an account and get exclusive content and features: save articles, download collections, and talk to tech insiders — all free for full access and benefits, join ieee as a paying member., how good is chatgpt at coding, really, study finds that while ai can be great, it also struggles due to training limitations.

This article is part of our exclusive IEEE Journal Watch series in partnership with IEEE Xplore.

Programmers have spent decades writing code for AI models , and now, in a full circle moment, AI is being used to write code. But how does an AI code generator compare to a human programmer?

A study published in the June issue of IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering evaluated the code produced by OpenAI’s ChatGPT in terms of functionality, complexity and security. The results show that ChatGPT has an extremely broad range of success when it comes to producing functional code—with a success rate ranging from anywhere as poor as 0.66 percent and as good as 89 percent—depending on the difficulty of the task, the programming language, and a number of other factors.

While in some cases the AI generator could produce better code than humans, the analysis also reveals some security concerns with AI-generated code.

Yutian Tang is a lecturer at the University of Glasgow who was involved in the study. He notes that AI-based code generation could provide some advantages in terms of enhancing productivity and automating software development tasks—but it’s important to understand the strengths and limitations of these models.

“By conducting a comprehensive analysis, we can uncover potential issues and limitations that arise in the ChatGPT-based code generation... [and] improve generation techniques,” Tang explains.

To explore these limitations in more detail, his team sought to test GPT-3.5’s ability to address 728 coding problems from the LeetCode testing platform in five programming languages: C, C++, Java, JavaScript, and Python .

“A reasonable hypothesis for why ChatGPT can do better with algorithm problems before 2021 is that these problems are frequently seen in the training dataset.” —Yutian Tang, University of Glasgow

Overall, ChatGPT was fairly good at solving problems in the different coding languages—but especially when attempting to solve coding problems that existed on LeetCode before 2021. For instance, it was able to produce functional code for easy, medium, and hard problems with success rates of about 89, 71, and 40 percent, respectively.

“However, when it comes to the algorithm problems after 2021, ChatGPT’s ability to generate functionally correct code is affected. It sometimes fails to understand the meaning of questions, even for easy level problems,” Tang notes.

For example, ChatGPT’s ability to produce functional code for “easy” coding problems dropped from 89 percent to 52 percent after 2021. And its ability to generate functional code for “hard” problems dropped from 40 percent to 0.66 percent after this time as well.

“A reasonable hypothesis for why ChatGPT can do better with algorithm problems before 2021 is that these problems are frequently seen in the training dataset,” Tang says.

Essentially, as coding evolves, ChatGPT has not been exposed yet to new problems and solutions. It lacks the critical thinking skills of a human and can only address problems it has previously encountered. This could explain why it is so much better at addressing older coding problems than newer ones.

“ChatGPT may generate incorrect code because it does not understand the meaning of algorithm problems.” —Yutian Tang, University of Glasgow

Interestingly, ChatGPT is able to generate code with smaller runtime and memory overheads than at least 50 percent of human solutions to the same LeetCode problems.

The researchers also explored the ability of ChatGPT to fix its own coding errors after receiving feedback from LeetCode. They randomly selected 50 coding scenarios where ChatGPT initially generated incorrect coding, either because it didn’t understand the content or problem at hand.

While ChatGPT was good at fixing compiling errors, it generally was not good at correcting its own mistakes.

“ChatGPT may generate incorrect code because it does not understand the meaning of algorithm problems, thus, this simple error feedback information is not enough,” Tang explains.

The researchers also found that ChatGPT-generated code did have a fair amount of vulnerabilities, such as a missing null test, but many of these were easily fixable. Their results also show that generated code in C was the most complex, followed by C++ and Python, which has a similar complexity to the human-written code.

Tangs says, based on these results, it’s important that developers using ChatGPT provide additional information to help ChatGPT better understand problems or avoid vulnerabilities.

“For example, when encountering more complex programming problems, developers can provide relevant knowledge as much as possible, and tell ChatGPT in the prompt which potential vulnerabilities to be aware of,” Tang says.

• What to Do When the Ghost in the Machine Is You ›
• How Coders Can Survive—and Thrive—in a ChatGPT World ›
• Coding Assistant - ChatGPT ›

Michelle Hampson is a freelance writer based in Halifax. She frequently contributes to Spectrum's Journal Watch coverage, which highlights newsworthy studies published in IEEE journals.

"struggles due to training limitations" isn't that EVERYONE's problem with EVERYTHING.

"I could be an awesome guitar playing, but I struggle due to training limitations."

"I could be a great Opera singer, but I struggle due to training limitations."

"I could be a great jockey, but I am 6'4"...." Ok, well maybe not everything.

ChatGPT sucks at coding because it's not an AI - it's a big ass word predictor.

I actually think the key here is writing good test suits to ensure AI does the right thing...

Here is the full argument: https://medium.com/@samuel.sperling/software-2-1-ai-is-coding-now-why-test-mastery-is-your-new-job-security-31a65e792f7f

Not very interesting study given it seems to only be based on ChatGPT 3.5 which is very old technology today

Windows on Arm Is Here to Stay

New fiber optics tech smashes data rate record, superconductor offers possible room-temperature bridge, related stories, what to do when the ghost in the machine is you, chatgpt’s new upgrade teases ai’s multimodal future, chatgpt may be a better improviser than you.