For this third blog post, I will focus on artificial intelligence, AI, particularly on the impact of AI on communication practices. In today’s digital world, AI is rapidly growing and improving. Determining if something was created by a real person or AI is becoming increasingly difficult. Again, communicators need strong skills to be able to determine what is real or what is AI generated but they also need additional training to incorporate into their work. As we discussed in blog # 2, AI has significant impact on our communications and is already taking over the human element of creation.
In order for communications professionals to overcome this challenge, it is crucial that they still create distinctive human stories. Not only is the human element of story-telling necessary, so is media and digital literacy. In “Media Literacy and AI-technologies in Digital Communication: Opportunities and risks,” the authors discuss the importance of media literacy and the opportunities and risks that come with using AI in digital communication. “It has been found that among scientist there is a common thread as risks of AI technologies: mental health and fake-news” (Bykov and Medvedeva, 2024). The authors argue that it is pointless to fight AI and that in fact it’s better to use AI to our advantage. For example, can we embrace AI by using it’s art for blog posts (see below). In my work as an academic advisor at SNHU I will often use ChatGPT to create an effective email that I can send to students that not only grabs their attention but also lists out the important policy details.
In the workplace, communication professionals can have more training, such as HOW to incorporate this technology into their work. This will help employees use AI for good and enhance their overall communication skills.
This image was created using the “generate with AI” feature in WordPress. While at first glance, it appears to be real humans discussing AI in the workplace, our human knowledge and skills show us the difference between AI and human-created-work: a clear giveaway are the number of hands in this image. If you look closely, you can see the woman in the gray jacket is missing a finger, and there is a mysterious hand, attached to no one on the table. Again, it is important for communications professionals to be able to spot AI generated images and implement digital fluency in their work.
here is a link that includes more tips for spotting AI in media.
Refrences:
Byvok, I., & Medvedeva, M. (2024). Media Literacy and AI-technologies in Digital Communication: Opportunities and Risks. 2024 Communication Strategies in Digital Society Seminar (ComSDS). https://doi.org/10.1109/ComSDS61892.2024.10502053
McFadden, C. (2025, October 18). 10 techniques for spotting AI-generated images. Interesting Engineering. https://interestingengineering.com/lists/10-ways-spot-ai-generated-images
Erin A Clark 