‘Overwhelming minority’: New report reveals one in ten Gen Zs use AI to cheat

High schoolers and university students are fessing up to using artificial intelligence to cheat on assignments, though experts say they’re the “overwhelming minority”. See the survey stats.

One in ten high school and university students say they have used generative artificial intelligence to plagiarise an assignment and would do so again, a new report in Gen Z’s use of the emerging technology has revealed.

The survey, conducted by youth-focused research agency YouthInsight, found that out of the 576 14-26-year-olds who participated, nine per cent had passed off an AI’s work as their own and would do it again, while 8 per cent had not but intended to do so in the future. However, a further 12 per cent of respondents said while they had used AI to plagiarise in the past, they wouldn’t do it again.

YouthInsight research director Dr Anna Denejkina said the results were not surprising and consistent with other research, and that it’s the “overwhelming minority” who do the wrong thing.

“There’s been previous research in Australia that’s found that when it comes to things like contract cheating, between eight to 11% of tertiary students have engaged in it,” she said.

“Generative AI is not increasing the rate of cheating, or plagiarism … it’s just being used as another tool to do that.”

AI (Artificial Intelligence) smartphone app ChatGPT is one of many tools that can be used to generate answers to essays and assignments, but the vast majority of students say they wouldn’t use it to cheat. Picture: Olivier Morin / AFP

Troublingly, the report also found that 61 per cent of Gen Zs have little or no confidence in their ability to tell human and AI-generate content apart, with female students the least confident of all. When asked if they check that the content generated by AI tools like ChatGPT is accurate, 42 per cent of high school students said ‘no’.

“It does show that young people are trusting the content without necessarily verifying it … and that really shows that within the education sector, especially for high school students, there needs to be more training … to ensure that [students] are checking the information, if any sources are generated, that they’re looking into those sources, and not just trusting that content.”

Dr Anna Denejkina says Australian schoolkids must learn how to verify the accuracy of AI-generated content and check sources.

AI SPARKS GEN Z JOB FEARS

A startling new report has found fears of an artificial intelligence future have prompted nearly one in five high school and university students to reconsider their current or future study and job prospects.

The survey, conducted by youth-focused research agency YouthInsight, found that of the 576 14-26-year-olds who participated, only a third are optimistic about the future of generative AI but 68 per cent agree it’s here to stay.

Responses from students intending to work in healthcare and the medical field indicated they were considered switching into more tech-based disciplines as a result of the rise of AI and concerns about job security.

YouthInsight research director Dr Anna Denejkina said Gen Zs don’t want to abandon the health sector entirely, but rather want to make themselves more competitive by “pivoting away from being more people-focused to be more tech-focused”.

“They’re worried that technology is going to be such a big thing within the health sector, that if they don’t have tech skills, [their jobs are] just going to be subsumed by large language models or AI in some capacity.”