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Generative AI: AI Tools for Research

Best Practices for Using Generative AI Tools for Research

Understanding AI Capabilities:

  • AI tools excel in certain tasks but face challenges in others.
  • ChatGPT is proficient in creating natural-sounding sentences.
  • But it Struggles with math tasks and tends to generate fictitious sources when asked for citations.

Prompt Engineering Techniques:

  • Experiment to find the most effective prompts for your goals.
  • Common techniques include:
    • Clearly and concisely defining the expected output.
    • Providing necessary information to be included in the response.
    • Briefly explaining a theory or desired style before making a query.
    • Requesting output in a specific style or format (e.g., "write a fairy tale," "respond as Elon Musk," "in the style of Frida Kahlo").
    • Offering examples of the expected task before the query.

Fine-tuning Output:

  • For complex queries, use multiple follow-up queries to refine the output.
  • Act as a co-editor, explicitly instructing ChatGPT on desired changes to the draft.

Fact-checking Claims:

  • Results from language-based generative AI may not always be factually correct.
  • Verify results against personal knowledge and other sources.
  • AI does not eliminate the need for lateral reading, checking multiple sources, and critical thinking.

AI Research Tools

AI tools for research can help you to discover new sources for your literature review or research assignment. These tools will synthesize information from large databases of scholarly output with the aim of finding the most relevant articles and saving researchers' time. As with our research databases or any other search tool, however, it's important not to rely on one tool for all of your research, as you will risk missing important information on your topic of interest.

Name What it does Underlying Data Cost? More Information
SciSpace

AI-powered research assistant.
It helps with literature review,
summarizing, writing, citations,
and more.

Semantic Scholar, PubMed

Free with paid
subscriptions
available

SciSpace Resources
Elicit Using LLMs, finds papers
relevant to your topic
by searching papers and
citations and extracting
and synthesizing
key information
 
Semantic Scholar, PubMed

Free trial of 5,000 Credit

Pay for credits after
those are used up.

Elicit Support
Perplexity Using LLMs, it's a search
engine that provides AI-
generated answers, 
including citations which
are linked above the
summaries
Semantic Scholar, PubMed Free with paid
subscriptions
available
Perplexity FAQs
Consensus Similar to Elicit, uses LLMs
to find and analyze 
answers to research questions
 
Semantic Scholar Free with paid
subscriptions
available
Consensus FAQs
Research 
Rabbit
A citation-based 
mapping tool.  Focuses
on relationships 
between research work. 
Uses visualizations to help
find similar papers and other
researchers in the field
Uses multiple
databases, but 
does not name them
Free
(always free)
Research Rabbit FAQs
Keenious A research tool for document
analysis. Find research 
relevant to any document, URL,
or text.  
Open Alex
open access and 
non open access
 
Free with paid
subscriptions
available
Keenious Help
Litmaps

Litmaps is a literature review assistant.
Use it to discover academic papers,
visualize research, share with colleagues,
and monitor new papers on your topic. 

Semantic Scholar, PubMed Free with paid
subscriptions
available
Litmaps User Guide