(17 Oct 2024) Ithaka S+R is excited to publish findings from our international survey of academic researchers, with a particular focus on those in the biomedical sciences. The survey, conducted with the support of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, provides a snapshot of researchers’ opinions about generative AI, how often they use it, which research tasks they use it for, and factors that serve as barriers to its use. Universities, professional organizations, and publishers will find the report to be valuable as they develop best practices around researchers’ use of generative AI. Funders and other stakeholders will gain insight into the adoption of this new technology to inform their decision making about how best to support cutting-edge research.
The survey’s key finding is that generative AI adoption is so far very mixed. While many biomedical researchers have experimented with using generative AI, that use is limited in scope and frequency. The main barrier to adoption is serious concern about the accuracy of generative AI’s outputs, while ethical concerns also rank highly as a barrier. Given the current quality of generative AI outputs and the lack of compelling best practices and models for its use, adoption of generative AI may plateau.
Other key findings include:
- Biomedical researchers have a moderate degree of interest in using generative AI in their research. Over 60 percent have experimented with doing so, but most use it sparingly or no longer use it at all.
- There are many barriers to greater adoption of generative AI, but the most significant are concerns about the accuracy of generative AI and a lack of clarity about best practices for using AI effectively and ethically.
- Over half of biomedical researchers expressed strong interest in biomed specific generative AI products, but only 14 percent had used existing biomed specific LLMs or tools.
- Use of generative AI in research is concentrated on scholarly communication tasks such as editing, writing, and accessing and interpreting scholarly literature.
- Many researchers would appreciate more support from funders, publishers, and universities to develop their skills using generative AI in their research.
Find out more here.
