Afraid my secondaries "sound like" AI even though I did not use AI.

[evenfeather]

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I'm re-reading some of the secondaries I already submitted, and I can't shake the feeling that some of them read a LOT like AI. I genuinely did not copy paste from AI or even used any of its phrases (I find them to be very robotic). But with a secondary prompt that asks me to elaborate on my responsibilities, skills learned, impact made, give an anecdote, AND how it motivated me to be a doctor in 1000 characters or less.... My response just becomes a bunch of super short sentences because I had to cut so many characters without sacrificing important content. So it all reads extremely robotic and fake. Especially when I need to list something, like "A, B, and C" or use phrases like "not only A but also B" which I've heard is something AI uses a lot.

This is mostly me ranting into the void, but it's really frustrating, especially since my actual writing voice tends to utilize longer sentence structures.

 

[olofmeister]

Dude I feel the exact same way, I feel like I waste so much time just trying to make sure it doesn't sound like AI, but it ends up just sounding so stuppid

 

[AnatomyAndAnonymity]

You're not alone! I have been worrying about this too. There's no reliable way to tell if an essay alone is AI, and the "A, B, and C" and "not only A but also B" are often used by AI because they're fairly common in formal writing, which is what ChatGPT tries to emulate. I don't expect AI suspicions to play a significant role in application evaluations unless it is blatantly obvious that someone just copied and pasted an AI response without tweaking the formatting. I tell myself that as long as the writing is professional, my particular style matters less than the message I'm conveying. Just make sure you sound genuine and reflective.

 

[evenfeather]

You're not alone! I have been worrying about this too. There's no reliable way to tell if an essay alone is AI, and the "A, B, and C" and "not only A but also B" are often used by AI because they're fairly common in formal writing, which is what ChatGPT tries to emulate. I don't expect AI suspicions to play a significant role in application evaluations unless it is blatantly obvious that someone just copied and pasted an AI response without tweaking the formatting. I tell myself that as long as the writing is professional, my particular style matters less than the message I'm conveying. Just make sure you sound genuine and reflective.

This is true but it's exactly what I'm afraid of. Like the admissions committee will "think" it is blatantly obvious I just copied and pasted an AI response, even though I didn't. I did my best to sound genuine and reflective, which shows through in the prompts with longer character limits, but ones with only 1000 characters or 200 words while having 3-4 components to address makes it really difficult lol. I guess there's really nothing else I can do other than try my best, but it's just frustrating having to even worry about this in the first place

 

[AnatomyAndAnonymity]

This is true but it's exactly what I'm afraid of. Like the admissions committee will "think" it is blatantly obvious I just copied and pasted an AI response, even though I didn't. I did my best to sound genuine and reflective, which shows through in the prompts with longer character limits, but ones with only 1000 characters or 200 words while having 3-4 components to address makes it really difficult lol. I guess there's really nothing else I can do other than try my best, but it's just frustrating having to even worry about this in the first place

By blatantly obvious, I mean like the weird formatting where it's not even a typical essay. For example:

Professionals in the healthcare field, like those in any industry, seize opportunities through a combination of proactive strategies and a commitment to ongoing learning and development. Here are some ways healthcare professionals often capitalize on opportunities:

1. Continuous Education and Training: Healthcare is an ever-evolving field. Professionals stay abreast of the latest developments, technological advancements, and best practices through continued education, workshops, certifications, and seminars. This ongoing learning allows them to seize opportunities that arise from new technologies, treatments, or methodologies.
2. Networking: Building a strong professional network within the healthcare field is crucial. Networking opens doors to various opportunities, such as job openings, collaborations, mentorship, and learning about new trends or research initiatives.
3. Remaining Flexible and Adaptable: Healthcare professionals need to be adaptable to changing environments. Being flexible and open to change allows them to recognize and seize opportunities that might arise from unexpected situations or evolving needs within the healthcare landscape.

You may think no one would be goofy enough to paste something like this without at least trying to make it look like a proper essay, but I have actually seen it. As long as your writing is nothing like this and you have avoided the now-infamous em dash, you should be okay even if they have an ungrounded suspicion for whatever reason. I hope adcoms are trained about how unreliable AI detection software is and how hard it is to distinguish between AI writing and human writing in certain contexts, like professional-style essays. Ultimately though, this is all just my copium to avoid paranoia that I'll get unfairly clocked too lol.

 

[olofmeister]

By blatantly obvious, I mean like the weird formatting where it's not even a typical essay. For example:

Professionals in the healthcare field, like those in any industry, seize opportunities through a combination of proactive strategies and a commitment to ongoing learning and development. Here are some ways healthcare professionals often capitalize on opportunities:

1. Continuous Education and Training: Healthcare is an ever-evolving field. Professionals stay abreast of the latest developments, technological advancements, and best practices through continued education, workshops, certifications, and seminars. This ongoing learning allows them to seize opportunities that arise from new technologies, treatments, or methodologies.
2. Networking: Building a strong professional network within the healthcare field is crucial. Networking opens doors to various opportunities, such as job openings, collaborations, mentorship, and learning about new trends or research initiatives.
3. Remaining Flexible and Adaptable: Healthcare professionals need to be adaptable to changing environments. Being flexible and open to change allows them to recognize and seize opportunities that might arise from unexpected situations or evolving needs within the healthcare landscape.

You may think no one would be goofy enough to paste something like this without at least trying to make it look like a proper essay, but I have actually seen it. As long as your writing is nothing like this and you have avoided the now-infamous em dash, you should be okay even if they have an ungrounded suspicion for whatever reason. I hope adcoms are trained about how unreliable AI detection software is and how hard it is to distinguish between AI writing and human writing in certain contexts, like professional-style essays. Ultimately though, this is all just my copium to avoid paranoia that I'll get unfairly clocked too lol.

I used the em dash a lot on some of my secondaries, I had no idea that was an AI thing until like last week. Chat is it over

 

[AnatomyAndAnonymity]

I used the em dash a lot on some of my secondaries, I had no idea that was an AI thing until like last week. Chat is it over

Not over, especially if there's evidence that it's just part of your writing style! I also liked using em dash, but made the painful choice to swap it for inferior punctuation due to paranoia about allegations (especially from schools that make you pinky promise you didn't even think about ChatGPT during your application cycle)

 

[Mr.Smile12]

In general, the LLMs likely use training data from rather educated individuals who can converse at a (US) tenth-grade educational level or better (using this from the way Grammarly likes to classify "professional" writing at times). No doubt, if you have a bachelor's degree level of education, most of your writing will likely mirror the training data. This is why it's more apparent to catch K-12 students using AI bots vs college-level students.

In other words, your writing has to show more "humanity" than the aggregate AI bot write-up. Unless we drastically change our rules of communication, your writing will likely resemble the average college-educated person.

 

[mistafab]

I wouldn't worry about it. Even if secondary writing was 100% AI, it wouldn't be a great secondary from an adcom perspective. There just isn't much humanity in there. It doesn't feel personal enough. basically, it would fall under an "okay" at best response so it isn't really a big help anyway. Lots of primarys and secondarys are "okay" and that's why writing something personal in the personal statement can really set you apart in a good way (and sometimes a bad way).

AI can be used as a tool to proofread, but that's about it. I'm not reading papers with the intent of catching people using AI (unless there is an obvious AI line, such as "this was AI so I cannot do xyz") which is embarrassing and will sink an app completely. I'm a doctor, not a detective.

 

[hihihohohaha84]

By blatantly obvious, I mean like the weird formatting where it's not even a typical essay. For example:

Professionals in the healthcare field, like those in any industry, seize opportunities through a combination of proactive strategies and a commitment to ongoing learning and development. Here are some ways healthcare professionals often capitalize on opportunities:

1. Continuous Education and Training: Healthcare is an ever-evolving field. Professionals stay abreast of the latest developments, technological advancements, and best practices through continued education, workshops, certifications, and seminars. This ongoing learning allows them to seize opportunities that arise from new technologies, treatments, or methodologies.
2. Networking: Building a strong professional network within the healthcare field is crucial. Networking opens doors to various opportunities, such as job openings, collaborations, mentorship, and learning about new trends or research initiatives.
3. Remaining Flexible and Adaptable: Healthcare professionals need to be adaptable to changing environments. Being flexible and open to change allows them to recognize and seize opportunities that might arise from unexpected situations or evolving needs within the healthcare landscape.

You may think no one would be goofy enough to paste something like this without at least trying to make it look like a proper essay, but I have actually seen it. As long as your writing is nothing like this and you have avoided the now-infamous em dash, you should be okay even if they have an ungrounded suspicion for whatever reason. I hope adcoms are trained about how unreliable AI detection software is and how hard it is to distinguish between AI writing and human writing in certain contexts, like professional-style essays. Ultimately though, this is all just my copium to avoid paranoia that I'll get unfairly clocked too lol.

The thing is I use em dash for many of my writings...

 

[AnatomyAndAnonymity]

The thing is I use em dash for many of my writings...

I do as well, but I swapped it out for other punctuation this cycle just because I was worried, I don't think it'll tank you either way : )

 

[anonDoc1955]

I wouldn't worry about it. Even if secondary writing was 100% AI, it wouldn't be a great secondary from an adcom perspective. There just isn't much humanity in there. It doesn't feel personal enough. basically, it would fall under an "okay" at best response so it isn't really a big help anyway. Lots of primarys and secondarys are "okay" and that's why writing something personal in the personal statement can really set you apart in a good way (and sometimes a bad way).

AI can be used as a tool to proofread, but that's about it. I'm not reading papers with the intent of catching people using AI (unless there is an obvious AI line, such as "this was AI so I cannot do xyz") which is embarrassing and will sink an app completely. I'm a doctor, not a detective.

I appreciate this response! This calmed a lot of my anxieties.

 

[premedbarista]

I was curious about this, so I wrote a paragraph about one of my experiences and then gave chatgpt the points and asked it to write a paragraph. It was, unfortunately, really similar to what I naturally wrote. Even looking back on my writing from like freshman year of college before AI was super common, my style and the way I construct ideas seem close to the way that LLMs write. I think it's because we both "trained" on similar academic/formal writing stuff, and I was really worried about it before I realized that there is literally nothing I can do about it. If I edit an essay to distance it from my usual way of writing, it doesn't feel natural or authentic. I'm admittedly not a great writer and tend to use the same sentence and paragraph structures over and over, so I've been trying to reduce that bc I think that repetitiveness makes it seem more AI-written (and boring lol). But beyond that, if the reader thinks AI wrote my essays bc of the way I naturally write, that's out of my control. I'm not going to spend too much effort trying to counteract that, especially when actual AI detection programs are so garbage.