Artificial Intelligence

How can we ethically use AI tools in our research?

• Explore the software you would like to use and fully review its terms and conditions. Many generative AI tools have questionable intellectual property terms.​

• Consider how the AI tool will be used in relation to your project.​

• Set clear guidelines with all research partners on how an AI tool should be used.​

• Be transparent about the use of your AI tool in your work.​

This template acknowledgement plan can be used to outline how you will incorporate AI tools into your work and make sure they are addressed or cited properly as needed.

Use of AI

• How will you acknowledge the use of AI in your research or manuscript?
• Decide early if they should be stated in the methods section of your paper, or perhaps in the results or discussion.
• Will you include an appendix or supplementary materials outlining your use of an AI tool to assist your work?

Ethics and Privacy Concerns

• If you are dealing with sensitive data (e.g. personal data from participants, confidential information, etc.) how will you protect, store, and anonymize it? Ideally, you have already came up with a data storage plan in your data management plan, but does this account for AI tools that might be used in relation to your data?
• Have you read the terms and conditions or any content policies of the AI tools you are using? Be sure that you are not agreeing to give over sensitive data by using these tools.

Permission

• Are you allowed to use AI tools as part of your research?

This could be a student submitting coursework or a researcher submitting a paper to a journal. Always be sure to check that use of AI tools is permitted before incorporating them into your work.

• Students - this may be stated in your syllabus, if not, consult your professor first.
• Researchers - this may be stated on a journal website, if not, consult the editor.

Some journals do not allow AI generative tools to be listed as authors, but they may be cited or listed in the methods. Be sure you are aware of any rules before submitting your work.

Reproducing Your Work

By incorporating AI tools into your research, you may have created a scenario in which your research cannot be directly replicated by other researchers. Be sure to test your methods to see if this is the case. If your work cannot be replicated, you should make this clear in your paper and explain in detail any steps you used with the tool so that the work can be reproduced for verification as closely as possible.

Access

• How did you obtain access to this tool?
• Is it an open access or publicly available resource?
• Did you have to pay for a subscription?

Oversight and Verification

• What is the level of oversight and verification of the data produced by this AI tool?
• How reliable is the information you are getting in exchange for the use of this tool?
• Can you be sure that this tool will be provide accurate results for your research?