𝐀𝐫𝐞 𝐖𝐞 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐋𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐁𝐞𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐀𝐈?

Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon University Report

Feb 17, 2025

Last week, Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon University unveiled a compelling report that echoes a theme I’ve explored in my writings for Harvard Business Review Türkiye: as our reliance on AI deepens, are we sacrificing our cognitive sharpness for convenience?

Let’s go back 20 years. My father could remember most of his friends' phone numbers by heart, navigate unfamiliar streets without assistance, and even memorize our ID numbers, just in case they were needed. Today, I find myself constantly relying on GPS, struggling to remember the path I just took. Aside from a few childhood phone numbers, I don’t even attempt to memorize any. And with artificial intelligence (AI) so deeply embedded in my daily life, I feel as though I’m caught in a much larger conundrum.

Step by step, we’re outsourcing our memory, attention, and even our problem-solving abilities to automation. Sure, the convenience is tempting—but is this comfort dulling us mentally?

How Technology Has Changed the Way We Think

Humans have always adapted to technology. Writing replaced oral traditions. The printing press made books accessible to the masses. Electricity, the internet, and social media all transformed our daily routines. Plato once worried that writing would weaken our memory and replace true wisdom with its appearance. Today, his concerns seem amplified as we witness new technologies triggering similar anxieties.

Over the past decade, we’ve embraced countless tools designed to make life easier. They organize our work routines, streamline our personal schedules, and save us time. Yet, this comfort also fosters a process known as cognitive offloading.

We no longer feel the need to put as much effort into solving problems as we used to. Instead of researching an issue ourselves, we turn to Google. Instead of writing an email from scratch, we let AI do the work. Instead of learning something new, we skim through short videos for a quick dose of “information.” While these shortcuts make life easier, they rob our minds of the chance to practice and grow. Curiosity, creativity, and critical thinking—uniquely human skills—become weaker, much like muscles that go unused.

The Google Effect and Beyond: Rising Concerns in the Age of AI

In a 2011 study published in Science, Betsy Sparrow and her team explored what’s known as the “Google Effect.” Their findings revealed that when people believe information is readily available online, their motivation to retain it in memory significantly decreases. Put simply, the thought “I can always Google it” erases the need to commit that knowledge to long-term memory.

So how has this effect evolved with AI?

🤖 Are We Thinking Less Because of AI?

Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon University Report surveyed 319 knowledge workers, revealing that increased reliance on AI correlates with diminished engagement in critical thinking tasks. Key takeaways include:

Decreased Engagement in Critical Thinking: As confidence in AI’s capabilities grows, the effort we put into critical thinking diminishes. This trend poses a subtle but profound risk to our professional skills and cognitive resilience.
Shift in Cognitive Effort: AI doesn't just perform tasks; it alters the nature of tasks we focus on. Instead of generating and synthesizing new content, we increasingly find ourselves verifying and integrating AI-generated outputs.
Critical Engagement and Task Confidence: Higher confidence in AI often leads to lower critical engagement, suggesting that our tools are not just assistants but can become crutches.

I have covered the following in my article as well. You can take a look at the research deeply from here. But, let’s go further with my insights.

1. Cognitive Abilities: Is Our Memory and Focus Declining?

Outsourcing Tasks to Technology: Relying on AI assistants to remember appointments, delegating complex problems to apps, or even letting AI handle spreadsheet analysis fosters the mindset that “I’ll just press a button, and the machine will do it.” Over time, this mentality pushes our brains into “rest mode,” weakening our memory retention skills. Beyond the “it’s on the internet anyway” logic, the ease of on-demand solutions deepens this reliance.
Constant Distractions: Your smartphone learns where you are, your habits, and even your mood, sending increasingly personalized notifications like “How about a break?” or “Don’t miss this sale!” As a result, your brain struggles to enter “deep focus” mode. Each time it tries to refocus, it incurs a “context-switching cost,” leading to fatigue and stress.

2. Creativity and Intuitive Thinking: Are We Losing Our Edge?

Excessive Feedback: AI provides “optimal” or “best” answers at every step, narrowing our space for intuitive thinking and discovery. Creative problem-solving thrives on trial and error, exploring different paths, and relying on instincts. Yet, by automating and shortening this process, AI may hinder the emergence of new ideas.
Too Much Guidance, Too Little Exploration: The apps and services around us often dictate, “Follow these steps.” But in doing so, we might miss the unexpected detours where groundbreaking ideas are often found. When we shut down those “side roads,” our creativity becomes trapped.

3. Consolidation Blocked: Data Overload and Sleep Disruption

Smart Recommendation Engines and Endless Screens: Platforms like YouTube and Netflix continuously feed us more content with prompts like “Want to watch the next video?” This “consumption marathon” leaves no time for the brain to consolidate and absorb information.
Late-Night AI Interactions: Instead of winding down at night, our brains remain engaged with machines or consuming content. This disrupts deep sleep and memory consolidation processes, undermining our mental health.

2. Emotions and Social Skills: Is Technology Making Us Lonelier?

The Digitalization of Social Relationships

Erosion of Face-to-Face Communication: Chatbots and “friend” apps are designed to ease loneliness but lack the natural flow of face-to-face interaction and body language. Constant interaction with such platforms replaces meaningful human dynamics with transactional exchanges, eroding the “micro-gestures” that spark empathy and deep understanding.
Technology Addiction: Algorithms tailored to your interests keep you hooked on your phone or computer, fostering a fear of missing out (FOMO). This addiction reinforces itself with every dopamine hit from notifications, making it harder to step away. Over time, we feel restless without our phones and measure our relationships by “like” counts.
Exposure to Extreme Content: Automated content curation can repeatedly show you similar (and sometimes extreme) material. From violence and hate speech to overly curated lives, this constant exposure dulls emotional sensitivity and normalizes the abnormal.

AI’s Emotional Engineering

Predicting and Guiding Emotions: Advanced AI systems can analyze your tone of voice or writing style to detect your mood, tailoring content or ads to keep you engaged—or buying.
The Danger of Artificial Companionship: Robotic or digital characters that simulate emotion may eventually lead us to deprioritize real human relationships. Real-life emotions are reciprocal, but machines are always programmed to “give you what you want.”

3. Taking Responsibility: Balancing Technology and Our Minds

Despite these risks, AI and digital technologies offer tremendous benefits: efficiency, instant access to global knowledge, and solutions to complex problems. The question lies in how we can use these tools responsibly.

Keeping Technology in the “Assistant” Role

Critical Thinking: Don’t blindly accept every report or automated decision. Ask questions like, “How was this result generated?” or “What biases might this dataset contain?”
Conscious Data Sharing: Be mindful of the information you share with apps. Instead of impulsively clicking “accept,” take a moment to explore privacy settings.
Digital Detox Intervals: Just as our muscles need rest, so do our brains. Charge your phone in a different room at night, take weekends off from social media, or turn off notifications to protect your mental health and focus.

Sustaining Human Connection and Learning

The Power of Face-to-Face Interaction: Empathy and social skills thrive in real-life interactions. Prioritize eye contact and conversation over constant phone use when spending time with loved ones.
Flexible, Exploratory Thinking: Instead of relying solely on AI suggestions, test your own unconventional ideas and take the occasional detour. Creativity and discovery often emerge from unexpected paths.

Embracing the Future Consciously

Research continues to warn us about the effects of screen addiction and digital media on the brain. With AI, we’re navigating even more uncharted waters. The speed of innovation, coupled with new AI-based applications and devices, increases daily. Will we experience a profound awakening one day, realizing the heavy price of this transformation? The answer remains uncertain. But the choice is ours.

Two paths lie before us: either we succumb to the conveniences of AI and technology, losing our mental and emotional independence, or we integrate them into our lives more consciously, thoughtfully, and humanely. By keeping AI as an “assistant” rather than a “rival,” we can preserve the precious space where our creativity and problem-solving abilities flourish.

We love technology and are shaped by it—but we must never stop being masters of our own minds.