Work

The New Normal and the Era of Misknowledge—Understanding Generative AI and Its Impacts on Knowledge Work

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: The revealed capability of generative AI tools can significantly transform the way knowledge work is conducted. With more tools being built and implemented, generative AI-aided knowledge work starts to emerge as a new normal, where knowledge workers shift a significant portion of their workloads to the tools. This new normal can lead to many concerns and issues including workers’ mental health, employees’ confusion in production, and potential spreading misknowledge. Considering the substantial portion of knowledge work in the US economy, this paper calls for more research to be conducted on this important area. This paper synthesizes relevant economic and behavioral research findings in the AI automation field and opinions of field experts, and presents a comprehensive framework, “generative AI-aided knowledge work”. This framework theoretically addresses concerns such as job replacement and organizational and behavioral factors in using generative AI and provides directions for future research and guidelines for practitioners in incorporating generative AI tools. This is one of the early attempts to provide a comprehensive overview of generative AI’s impacts on knowledge workers and production. It has the potential to seed future research in many areas such as countering misknowledge and employees’ mental health.

Source: Knowledge

DOI: 10.3390/knowledge5040022

Authors: Zhiguo Yang, Xiang Guo, Peng Zhang

Institution: Missouri State University

Language: English

Topic: Ethics and Social Impacts of AI

Subfield: Safety Research

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Decent work and economic growth

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $1,207