CogniTrace

1. Prototype link (Please submit a link to a playable prototype, not a link to your design file) Link

2. Describe your project (max 150 words) Whether it is searching for answers on an assignment, or for simply venting out emotions as an outlet, many college students are heavily reliant on AI. Overall, with the rise of AI being integrated into almost all forms of social media and search engines, it has become extremely common for students to depend on AI for tasks that limit human creativity. In order to prevent human creativity from being diminished, we questioned, “How might we help students become more mindful of and lessen their reliance on AI?” This led to the creation of CogniTrace. CogniTrace enables college students who want to decrease their dependence on AI by providing a “wrapped” reflection. The wrapped categorizes users’ most searched queries, provides feedback through resources relating to these categories, and stimulates friendly competition in minimizing AI usage with friends.

3. Describe your research process and findings. If you conducted any surveys or interviews, please include the survey form and/or interview questions here. If you conducted secondary research by pulling from online sources, please include a link to your sources. (Max 500 words) Competitive analysis: tinyurl.com/connect4-competitiveanalysis/ Survey: https://forms.gle/DTEtQXfN1fNnmGvh6 FigJam: https://tinyurl.com/CogniTrace

Initially, our team began brainstorming topics under keywords which are intertwined with being human, such as “Hobbies”, “Community”, and “Well-being” in FigJam. However, we had trouble connecting these back to the prompt with AI. The topics were connected to the theme of “being human”, but our ideas for them were completely unrelated to the second half of the prompt, “in the face of AI”. In order to focus on the issue of “being human” in the face of AI, we began to think about what downfalls arise with the existence of it. When considering AI’s negative impact on humans, our discussion progressed into how frequent use of AI for college students has diminished human traits, such as creativity. From there, we chose to research how students utilize AI, and how they feel it impacts them.

Across 60+ respondents, we gathered information on what type of AI college students use, the frequency of their use, their perspective on how AI has impacted humans, and how they personally use it. Each college student’s AI usage was categorized under six categories; entertainment, productivity, learning, creative tasks, personal, and other. Our findings revealed 70% of college students in our sample utilize ChatGPT frequently for productivity and learning purposes. Despite most respondents' frequent use of AI, many expressed they only use it when necessary, and showed a desire to decrease their usage. One respondent shares, “It has quickly created a reliance that I did not perceive happening before, and its effects in academia and research are unfathomable at the moment”. To further decide on how to resolve this dependency, we conducted secondary research. After sifting through articles (tinyurl.com/ActivTrakArticle, https://toggl.com/, tinyurl.com/SocialFeverReviews), we performed a competitive analysis comparing similar apps providing habit tracking and a “wrapped” feature. This comparison included Spotify, Receiptify, Toggl, BeReal, Social Fever, ActivTrack, Google Photos, and IOS Screen Time. By analyzing how these applications tracked usage, displayed that information for the users, and the community features involved, we could implement feedback into our own app. For instance, Spotify allows users to access a “wrapped” list of the music they listened to, but the summary is only given once at the end of the year. Through this analysis, we developed CogniTrace to be an engaging app that encourages reflection on AI usage, and taking action to maintain our human thinking processes in small steps by reading suggested articles related to users’ queries rather than direct answers.

1. Describe your most important design decisions. What research findings and/or user testing results led you to make these decisions? (Max 500 words) When reviewing our initial user research, a few recurring themes emerged: respondents expressed both reliance on AI for tasks like essay writing, as well as concerns about its long-term impact on critical thinking, problem-solving, and academic integrity. Several users expressed worries that AI is reducing the overall effort needed to engage with tasks, which could eventually lead to a decline in critical thinking abilities.

For example, one respondent wrote: “I feel like in certain ways it has really helped me get the ball rolling on an assignment on helped me get out of a creative rut. Other times though I question if I'm being as creative or am learning to the same extent because I can see myself jump to AI for answers before trying to sit on these.” Many others shared similar sentiments, acknowledging the benefits of AI for inspiration or basic help but highlighting the issues that arise when people are regularly using these tools to do their work for them. This not only leads to laziness but impacts vital aspects of being human, including creativity and the ability to form our own thoughts on various topics.

Furthermore, from the competitive analysis we conducted across eight different apps, we found that none had all of the following features: an AI usage tracker, regular reports on user data, and a social or community aspect. To support our goal of helping students be mindful of and limit their AI reliance, we decided to implement all three of these features into our app.

These insights provided clear direction for our design process. We needed a solution that would still allow users to leverage AI’s benefits while encouraging them to limit and be aware of their possible over-usage and reliance. Some people are aware of their overuse of AI but don’t have enough incentive to do anything about it. Others are unaware that they might be relying too much on AI. To address this, we decided to introduce a leaderboard system based on users’ AI usage, which is shown to them in weekly reports. The idea was to gamify the experience, providing a way to compete and engage with AI tools in a more balanced manner. The leaderboard would allow users to track their progress relative to others, to motivate them to track their progress with friends. It serves both as friendly competition and a source of accountability to help users confront their overreliance on AI in a fun way.

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