Here’s how many teens use ChatGPT for homework help, ‘research’ now

ChatGPT or CheatGPT?

The number of teens who admitted to using ChatGPT as a homework helper more than doubled last year, according to a recent survey from the Pew Research Center.

The team surveyed teens 13 to 17, finding that students are becoming increasingly familiar and comfortable with the technology the longer it and they are around.

According to the survey, about 26% of teens used the AI chatbot to help them complete their schoolwork in 2024 — up from 13% in 2023.

The majority (73%) of adolescents still said they don’t use the technology to complete their assignments.

But attitudes are shifting.

One of the most striking changes from last year is the increased use of ChatGPT by black and hispanic teens for school-related tasks.

In 2023, 13% of black and 11% of hispanic teens reported using the chatbot for academic purposes. However, by 2024, that number surged to 31%.

In comparison, white teens remained less likely to turn to ChatGPT for schoolwork, with only 22% reporting its use in 2024, though this is still an uptick from the previous year.

Along with black and hispanic students, older teens are also embracing technology to upgrade their homework help.

Interestingly, there was no significant difference in ChatGPT usage based on gender or household income.

“It’s out there,” Pengcheng Shi, an associate dean in the Department of Computing and Information Sciences at Rochester Institute of Technology, previously told The Post.

“You cannot stop people from using it, so now the question becomes, how to best use it,” he added.

How do teens think the technology can appropriately be used?

Overall, teens’ acceptance of its role varied depending on the task input into the chat.

Most teens (54%) agreed it’s acceptable to use ChatGPT for researching new topics — only 9% disagreed.

However, they were much less supportive of using the technology to complete more in-depth tasks or finish assignments.

Teens were divided on their views of using ChatGPT to solve math problems (29% say it’s acceptable and 28% say it’s not) and mostly agreed it’s wrong to rely on the program to type up an essay (18% say it’s alright but 42% say it’s unacceptable).

“I think the pressure here is less on students, and much more on faculty to really find a way to incorporate new technologies,” Jamie Cohen, an assistant professor of media studies at CUNY Queens College, previously told The Post.

“You have to explain how these systems work, what the data sets are, why the data sets are flawed and why this isn’t an acceptable way of handing in a paper,” Cohen said.

Students who are familiar with ChatGPT are more likely to use it for schoolwork and consider it acceptable — about 56% of those who’ve heard “a lot” about ChatGPT use it for their schoolwork, compared to just 18% of teens who have only heard “a little” about it.

These mixed opinions reflect the ongoing debate around the ethics of using AI tools — the conversation updates along with the technology.