It’s no longer a secret that artificial intelligence outperforms humans in strategy games, website design, and data processing. However, creative thinking can now be added to this list.
AI chatbots outperformed humans when asked to devise alternative uses for everyday objects, Dailymail reported.
The researchers said AI uses a skill known as divergent thinking, which is a thought process or method used to generate creative ideas by exploring many possible solutions.
THE STUDY INVOLVED 256 VOLUNTEERS AND THREE ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE CHAT ROBOTS
The study, conducted by the University of Stavanger in Norway, involved 256 human volunteers and three artificial intelligence chatbots (ChatGPT3, ChatGPT4 and Copy.Ai), and these robots were asked to provide multiple uses for a rope, box, pen and candle.
BETTER PERFORMANCE THAN HUMANS
When evaluated with what are known as “alternative use tasks,” a type of divergent thinking exercise that asks a person to think of as many possible uses for a simple object, chatbots outperformed humans on average.
However, researchers also found that the best human ideas match or exceed those of artificial intelligence.
“THE FINDINGS SHOW THAT HE IS BETTER THAN MOST PEOPLE, BUT…”
“Indeed, this is a remarkable type of ability exhibited by AI chatbots. The findings show that AI is better than most humans at creative thinking,” said study author Simone Grassini of the University of Stavanger in Norway. he said and added:
“However, we must remember that we used the divergent thinking task to measure creative thinking, that is, we were measuring a specific type of creative thinking, not creativity in general. Our results suggest that, at least for now, the best humans still outperform AI.”