4 Days Without ChatGPT: Diary Study of Knowledge Workers’ LLM Withdrawal

Researchers at KAIST ran a diary study where 10 heavy LLM users avoided ChatGPT for four days and logged urges.

Without LLMs, participants reported harder searches, slower writing, more delays, and increased work time.

Participants felt higher social cost asking people for help, though some found human help more useful.

All participants said fully quitting LLMs was unrealistic and the team recommends treating LLMs as infrastructure.