# Workshop Paper: An empirical study to understand how students use ChatGPT for writing essays and how it affects their ownership

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2405.13890 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.13890/

## Key facts

- Cited by 5 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 22 May 2024.

## Built on by (most cited first, 5 of 5)

- [Societal Impacts Research Requires Benchmarks for Creative Composition Tasks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.06549/) (2025)
- [What happens when reviewers receive AI feedback in their reviews?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.13817/) (2026)
- [Distinguishing Artificial from Authentic: Evaluating LLMs for Detecting LLM-Generated Content](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2607.20446/) (2026)
- [Can AI be a moral victim? The role of moral patiency and ownership perceptions in ethical judgments of using AI-generated content](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.26956/) (2026)
- [Right Words, Wrong Moment: A Clinician-Grounded Analysis of Distress in 19,930 Conversations between Young People and ChatGPT](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.35953/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

This paper was a Workshop Paper. See the full paper which will be presented at CHI 2026: arXiv:2501.10551; As large language models (LLMs) become more powerful and ubiquitous, systems like ChatGPT are increasingly used by students to help them with writing tasks. To better understand how these tools are used, we investigate how students might use an LLM for essay writing, for example, to study the queries asked to ChatGPT and the responses that ChatGPT gives. To that end, we plan to conduct a user study that will record the user writing process and present them with the opportunity to use ChatGPT as an AI assistant. This study's findings will help us understand how these tools are used and how practitioners -- such as educators and essay readers -- should consider writing education and evaluation based on essay writing.