In the past year, the conversation around artificial intelligence in education has grown louder—and more anxious. The recent MIT Media Lab study, Your Brain on ChatGPT, struck a nerve. It showed that when students used ChatGPT to write essays, brain activity in memory and executive regions dropped. Understandably, this has sparked concern: Is AI harming how students think? Will reliance on tools like ChatGPT undermine learning?
To me, the results of the study weren’t surprising—and they aren’t a reason to panic.
Because for almost 50 years, I’ve been working on a different question: What makes learning possible in the first place?
The study reveals a truth I’ve witnessed time and again: when critical cognitive functions like reasoning, memory, and thinking are weak —students lean on tools rather than engage with them. AI becomes a crutch, not a catalyst. It’s not that the tool is the problem. It’s that, in many cases, the brain isn’t ready to use it well.
AI doesn’t inherently bypass thinking—it reveals where critical thinking hasn’t been developed.
In recent months, schools around the world have raced to roll out AI ethics policies and courses on how to interact effectively with AI tools. These are valuable. But we’re overlooking something even more foundational: cognitive readiness.
Can a student compare and contrast multiple ideas in mind? Spot logical inconsistencies? Reflect before reacting?
These aren’t skills or traits—they’re cognitive functions. And decades of research show us that these functions can be strengthened. They are not fixed.
The emerging research on AI and education is often framed as a dichotomy: Does AI help or harm learning? Studies like those from MIT Media Lab and Wharton (link below) will continue to fuel this debate. But from my perspective, the more interesting questions lie beneath the surface.
What really matters is how the brain of the user is or is not prepared to engage with AI. These studies – implying that using AI lessens thinking, is used as a crutch, and effects retention and learning - don’t yet capture the full picture. I want to know how differences in cognitive capacity affect students’ use of AI, how that shapes learning outcomes, and the impact of strengthening critical cognitive functions before introducing AI tools.
I’m especially curious about future studies that explore how students with varying levels of cognitive readiness interact with AI:
My experience—and decades of neuroplasticity research—suggest that the future of AI in education depends less on the tool itself and more on the readiness of the brain using it. Investigating how cognitive training can build that readiness before AI use will be key to unlocking AI’s true potential as a learning partner.
After decades of working with learners who struggle, not because they lack intelligence, but because key cognitive functions haven’t developed as they should—I’ve learned this: if we want students to thrive in an AI-integrated world, we must start with the brain.
Build the foundation first — attention, reasoning, thinking, memory, self-monitoring. These are not skills. They are part of the cognitive infrastructure that allows a student to think critically, reflect, and truly learn. Without these, AI becomes a crutch. With them, it can be a tool.
Students need to engage their own thinking first. AI should come after the cognitive resources are in place — supporting, extending, and refining what the brain has already begun. We must resist the temptation to use AI as a replacement for the targeted neuroplastic work that builds lasting cognitive strength.
We don’t need to fear AI. But we do need to prepare the brain to meet it.
That preparation doesn’t begin with teaching how to use AI platforms or digital skills—it begins with strengthening the learner’s brain.
This has always been my mission: not to work around the problem, but to change the brain itself so it is capable of solving problems. To help students not just get by but truly think for themselves.
The conversation around AI in education is growing louder—but it’s incomplete without a focus on the brain’s capacity to engage with it.
So instead of asking, Is AI harming education? —let’s ask the deeper question:
Are we building the brains that are ready to use AI well?
Our focus should be on strengthening the brain’s cognitive capacity, the foundation for independent thought and real understanding that is the bedrock of all learning, and which in turn prepares students for a future of collaborative engagement with whatever tools may be available.
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