Do you say “please” and “thank you” when talking to artificial intelligence to brainstorm ideas, advice or homework help? As AI-powered chatbots like ChatGPT become increasingly integrated into students’ daily routines, many are beginning to consider how they approach these interactions.
Gauresh Srivastava (12)
“Being polite to AI feels unnecessary,” senior Gauresh Srivastava said. “It’s not a real person, so there’s no reason to treat it like one. If you add extra prompts — like ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ — it just makes the prompt longer and uses more energy, which is wasteful. Being more direct also helps you get more honest and clearer results. It’s better to just get straight to the point and use AI as a tool instead of treating it like a human.”
Jacey Tseng (11)
“For the sake of convenience, it’s probably best not to be polite, because I’m usually just looking for something quick — like a Google search answer,” junior Jacey Tseng said. “I don’t really feel the need to be polite in that situation. For example, when I Google something, I don’t say, ‘Could I please have the recipe for chocolate chip cookies?’ I just type ‘recipe for chocolate chip cookies,’ and I feel like with AI, it’s kind of the same thing. It’s more about efficiency than manners. For me, it’s mostly just about getting the information quickly.”
Shripriya Kalbhavi (11)
“I think it’s important to be polite to AI,” junior Shripriya Kalbhavi said. “Not just because of the idea of AI running our systems one day in the future, but also because chatbots learn a lot from past conversations with other users. I think everyone should be polite because you can almost condition it to be polite to other people. When you think about it, these are the same systems that are being used now to hire people and look at college applications. So if you’re polite to AI, you might be improving it for users in general.”
Ray Hsu (9)
“Saying ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ to AI is a good habit to practice,” freshman Ray Hsu said. “If you get used to being aggressive or demanding just to get answers, that mindset can carry over into real-life conversations.”
“I don’t think people have to say ‘please’ or ‘thank you’ to AI, but it is a good habit to practice,” Hsu said. “If you get used to being aggressive or demanding just to get answers, that mindset can carry over into real-life conversations. Being polite, even with AI, can be good practice for better communication overall.”
