Abstract

As artificial intelligence becomes more prevalent in education, concerns about students' cognitive development grow. Many people believe that excessive reliance weakens independent thinking. This study investigates the relationship between ChatGPT dependency and critical thinking skills among 227 psychology students at Bestlink College of the Philippines, determining whether AI impedes or promotes intellectual development. A descriptive-correlational quantitative research design was used to examine the variables without manipulation. Purposive sampling was used to select the aforementioned participants based on their actual academic experience with ChatGPT. The data were collected using a structured survey questionnaire. A Shapiro-Wilk normality test was used to ensure statistical accuracy. For non-normally distributed data (p < 0.05), the nonparametric Spearman's rho (rs) was used to analyze the correlation between variables. The study revealed a statistically significant moderate positive correlation between ChatGPT dependency and critical thinking skills (rs = 0.35, p < 0.001). This contradicts the assumption that AI dependency weakens cognitive abilities; instead, higher reliance was associated with higher critical thinking levels. The strongest correlations appeared in Reading (rs = 0.44, p < 0.001) and Writing (rs = 0.36, p < 0.001). The relationship in Numeracy was weaker but still significant (rs = 0.16, p = 0.01). Consequently, the null hypothesis was rejected across all domains. The findings suggest that ChatGPT serves as a cognitive support tool for complex concepts and reasoning. AI appears to be more effective for language-based tasks than numeracy. One study limitation is the reliance on self-reports. Future research should look into longitudinal effects. Institutions should encourage guided AI use to improve critical thinking.