Can GenAI Improve Academic Performance? Evidence from the Social and Behavioral Sciences

2025/10/02 by Dragan Filimonovic, Christian Rutzer, Filimonovic, Dragan +3 · 7 voices · 2 citations
Medicine · Social Sciences · Decision Sciences · #Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare and Education #Ethics and Social Impacts of AI #scientometrics and bibliometrics research

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2510.02408

Abstract

This paper estimates the effect of Generative AI (GenAI) adoption on scientific productivity and quality in the social and behavioral sciences. Using matched author-level panel data and a difference-in-differences design, we find that GenAI adoption is associated with sizable increases in research productivity, measured by the number of published papers. It also leads to moderate gains in publication quality, based on journal impact factors. These effects are most pronounced among early-career researchers, authors working in technically complex subfields, and those from non-English-speaking countries. The results suggest that GenAI tools may help lower some structural barriers in academic publishing and promote more inclusive participation in research.

Citations

• Gender disparities in the impact of generative artificial intelligence: Evidence from academia.
• Delving into LLM-assisted writing in biomedical publications through excess vocabulary
• Monitoring AI-Modified Content at Scale: A Case Study on the Impact of ChatGPT on AI Conference Peer Reviews
• Generative AI for Economic Research: Use Cases and Implications for Economists
• The manifold costs of being a non-native English speaker in science

Cited by

• Generative AI as a Linguistic Equalizer in Global Science
• An Instrument to Evaluate Governance Proposals: AI Policy Analysis at Scale

Discussions

• Does AI improve or undercut academic scholarship? A new study finds that academics who use AI increased both the quantity & quality of their academic scholarship and it appears to reduces inequality ( [bsky, 31 points, 5 comments]
• Je survole un papier sur les effets des genAI sur l'écriture scientifique et sa production, je ne résiste donc pas à mettre (même si c'est maintenant bien connu) la liste des mots identifiés comme aya [bsky, 23 points, 1 comments]
• Betteridge’s law of headlines is strong with this one. arxiv.org/abs/2510.02408 [bsky, 16 points, 2 comments]
• Paper: arxiv.org/pdf/2510.02408 [bsky, 11 points, 0 comments]
• GenAI is rewriting how science gets done. 🔹 +36 % more papers by users in 2024 🔹 Quality ↑ via higher-impact journals 🔹 Largest boost: early-career & non-English researchers 🔹 Productivity and equ [bsky, 1 points, 0 comments]
• Preprint: El uso de IA y chatbots aumenta la producción de publicaciones científicas: arxiv.org/abs/2510.02408 [bsky, 1 points, 1 comments]
• Can GenAI Improve Academic Performance? Evidence from the Social and Behavioral Sciences arxiv.org/abs/2510.02408 Interesting finding, potentially, that GenAI improves inclusiveness because it can mit [bsky, 0 points, 1 comments]

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