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Generative AI & Higher Ed: Evaluating AI Responses

A look at how generative AI is being used in higher education and resources to help explain the uses and limitations of AI.

Academic Honesty

While Beloit College does not have an official campus policy regarding AI, you should always check your professor's syllabus or talk to them directly about AI use. You should also consider the limitations and ethical concerns surrounding AI use.

When using AI consider:

  • Did I cross-reference the information I’m using?
  • Does the manner in which I am using this generative AI tool allow for me to still come to my own conclusions? Did I come to these findings prior to or after using generative AI? 
  • Have I informed myself on the subject matter using other methods prior to using generative AI?

Some limitations of generative AI tools like ChatGPT include:

  • Outdated information
  • Fabricated responses that can be wrong
  • Biased responses

If you are allowed to use generative AI tools, follow the appropriate citation tools. Check out the Citing AI tab of this guide for more information.

Critically Evaluate Generative AI Responses

Generative AI tools may seem like a step up from regular search engines or databases, but it's important to remember that AI's knowledge is often not current. AI tools also generate new text, so responses won't always be the same. 

As with any source of information, It's important to critically evaluate the information that you get from AI tools. For example. OpenAI outlines three limitations you should know about ChatGPT:

  1. ChatGPT may hallucinate. This means the tool might generate incorrect or misleading information that looks convincing. "Hallucinations" can take the form of false citations or quotes, made up facts Sometimes, these are facts that it makes up, or biased information.
  2. ChatGPT's free version (GPT 3.5) was trained on data that ends in September 2021. It can't factually answer questions about events or information created after September 2021. It was also trained mostly on English-language sources.
  3. Finally, ChatGPT cannot evaluate or verify the results that it outputs. It can't critically evaluate its own answers.

While this list specifically address ChatGPT, you should be skeptical of responses you get from all generative AI tools. In a world that uses AI, it will be more important than ever to be able to critically evaluate information!

The ROBOT Test

Librarians Amanda Wheatley and Sandy Hervieux at McGill University created the ROBOT framework to help people determine the reliability of AI sources. You can find the framework below:

Reliability, Objective, Bias, Ownership, Type

Reliability
How reliable is the information available about the AI technology?
If it’s not produced by the party responsible for the AI, what are the author’s credentials? Bias?
If it is produced by the party responsible for the AI, how much information are they making available? 
Is information only partially available due to trade secrets?
How biased is the information that they produce?

Objective
What is the goal or objective of the use of AI?
What is the goal of sharing information about it?
To inform?
To convince?
To find financial support?
 

Bias
What could create bias in the AI technology?
Are there ethical issues associated with this?
Are bias or ethical issues acknowledged?
By the source of information?
By the party responsible for the AI?
By its users?
 

Owner
Who is the owner or developer of the AI technology?
Who is responsible for it?
Is it a private company?
The government?
A think tank or research group?
Who has access to it?
Who can use it?
 

Type
Which subtype of AI is it?
Is the technology theoretical or applied?
What kind of information system does it rely on?
Does it rely on human intervention? 
 

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

To cite in APA: Hervieux, S. & Wheatley, A. (2020). The ROBOT test [Evaluation tool]. The LibrAIry. https://thelibrairy.wordpress.com/2020/03/11/the-robot-test