We all like to believe we have complete control over our decisions. Ask most people how they chose their undergrad major, for example, or their career path or spouse, and they’ll probably give you a perfectly cogent response about how they weighed the relevant pros and cons and, after careful consideration, chose the best route accordingly. But as decades of cognitive science can attest, our decision-making processes are far from objective: we’re pushed and pulled around by a maelstrom of unconscious forces.

These days, our psyches are also being molded by AI. Many of you will have undoubtedly heard of “ automation bias ,” the well-documented tendency for people to reflectively defer to AI-generated verdicts even when they run against their own judgment. But it runs much deeper than that. A recent study from MIT has shown that the simple act of viewing AI-generated imagery can actually warp your memory .…