Creativity is core to being human. Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) holds promise for humans to be more creative by offering new ideas, or less creative by anchoring on GenAI ideas. We study the causal impact of GenAI on the production of a creative output in an online experimental study where some writers are could obtain ideas for a story from a GenAI platform. Access to GenAI ideas causes an increase in the writer's creativity with stories being evaluated as better written and more enjoyable, especially among less creative writers. However, GenAI-enabled stories are more similar to each other than stories by humans alone. Our results have implications for researchers, policy-makers and practitioners interested in bolstering creativity, but point to potential downstream consequences from over-reliance.

翻译：创造力是人类的核心特质。生成式人工智能（GenAI）既可能通过提供新思路帮助人类更具创造力，也可能因锚定于GenAI的创意而抑制创造力。我们通过一项在线实验研究，考察GenAI对创意产出因果效应，其中部分写作者可从GenAI平台获取故事灵感。获取GenAI创意可提升写作者的创造力，其创作的故事被评为文笔更佳、趣味性更强，尤其对于创造力较弱的写作者而言更是如此。然而，借助GenAI创作的故事彼此间相似度高于纯人类创作的故事。我们的研究结果对关注创造力提升的研究者、政策制定者和实践者具有启示意义，同时指出了过度依赖GenAI可能引发的潜在后续影响。