Is ChatGPT's academic style detectable by AI tools?

The recent study encouraged ChatGPT to generate academic-style content through a series of prompts and questions.

ChatGPT, the newest AI chatbot platform launched in November 2022, has great potential for creating exciting opportunities in academics. It has already gained wide usage by individuals from various sectors, including students who use ChatGPT to perform academic tasks.

Despite the potential of ChatGPT's Large Language Machine (LLM) to revolutionize research and education, the researchers expressed concerns about plagiarism and academic integrity. (Shutterstock)

However, a recent study has found that the "academic style" content produced by ChatGPT tends to follow a formulaic pattern and that many existing tools can detect the pattern despite the platform being more sophisticated than that of previous AI innovations.

The research conducted by the scholars from Plymouth Marjon University and the University of Plymouth highlights the importance for educational institutions to take necessary measures to prevent academic dishonesty among students. Despite the potential of ChatGPT's Large Language Machine (LLM) to revolutionise research and education, the researchers expressed concerns about plagiarism and academic integrity.

In addition to highlighting concerns about academic honesty and plagiarism in the use of ChatGPT, the recent study also encouraged to generate academic-style content through a series of prompts and questions.

Interestingly, the study also involved providing ChatGPT with prompts and questions to produce academic-style content, such as "Write an original academic paper, with references, describing the implications of GPT-3 for assessment in higher education," "How can academics prevent students from plagiarizing using GPT-3," and "Produce several witty and intelligent titles for an academic research paper on the challenges universities face in ChatGPT and plagiarism."

According to the study, this latest AI development clearly poses significant challenges for universities, particularly in testing student knowledge and teaching writing skills - but, on the bright side, it provides an opportunity for us to reconsider what students should learn and why.

"I'd like to think that AI would enable us to automate some of the more administrative tasks academics do, allowing more time to be spent working with student," said the study's lead author and professor at Plymouth Marjon University.

The study also discussed "Banning ChatGPT," which has already been implemented in New York schools, but stated that it is a short-term solution that will not address the issue. AI is already widely available to students outside of their educational institutions, and companies such as Microsoft and Google are rapidly incorporating it into search engines and office suites.

(With PTI inputs)