Turnitin's New AI Writing-Detection Features for Educators are Now Live

• By Kristal Kuykendall
• 04/06/23

As of this week, plagiarism detection software Turnitin now includes new AI-writing detection features that “identify the use of AI writing tools including ChatGPT, with 98% confidence,” the company said.

Turnitin had been working on its AI-writing detection capabilities for nearly two years before the public introduction of OpenAI's ChatGPT last fall, according to Turnitin.

The new features were “built to help educators and academic institutions identify AI-generated text in student-written submissions” and do not recommend or imply any judgment on how educators should handle the identified AI-generated text. The new capabilities are integrated into the existing Turnitin solutions — including Turnitin Feedback Studio (TFS), TFS with Originality, Turnitin Originality, Turnitin Similarity, Simcheck, Originality Check and Originality Check+ — and are also accessible through learning management systems, the company said. No additional steps are required for current Turnitin education users to access the AI detection tools. 

Two former teachers leading the development of Turnitin’s AI writing tools shared their insights on ChatGPT’s implications for education and argued that educators should be capitalizing on ChatGPT — not simply avoiding it or banning it altogether. 

David Adamson, principal machine learning scientist at Turnitin, and Patti West-Smith, senior director of customer engagement, have been working on Turnitin’s AI writing detection feature and related tools to help educators using Turnitin solutions to better understand ChatGPT — and show educators how to use AI to save themselves time and how to tweak assignments so that ChatGPT cannot earn a good grade on writing assignments. Adamson gave a virtual demo of the AI-writing detection feature recently, which can be watched at the bottom of this report.

Adamson, who taught computer science and math at Digital Harbor High in Baltimore, and West-Smith, who worked in public schools for 19 years as a teacher, curriculum supervisor, and principal, both believe that ChatGPT has presented a growth opportunity — or perhaps more like a growth demand — for writing instruction. They indicated that additional AI-detection and ChatGPT tools for educators are on the way.

“We need to stay abreast of how the tools are being used and which tools are getting used to collect representative examples of, of that usage — and, more importantly, adapt to what's appropriate in classroom usage,” Adamson said. “We want to do more than just … show you a number … we're starting with just showing the instructor what's there so they can understand how AI writing is being used in classroom where it might be being used. But we want to add explanation, we want to add next steps and interpretation.”