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We recently published an article in this space highlighting some of the results of a groundbreaking survey conducted by LexisNexis regarding how generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools, such as ChatGPT, are impacting the legal profession in these early days of their commercial availability.
In the first post, we shared our findings from talking to consumers nationwide about their awareness of generative AI tools and their initial thoughts about specific types of legal needs for which they might consider using these tools. In this post, we will turn the spotlight onto what we learned from talking to lawyers nationwide — in both private and corporate practice — about their own level of familiarity with generative AI and how they anticipate this transformational technology will help them in the practice of law.
LexisNexis completed the most extensive legal profession study of generative AI, and its potential impact on the practice of law, in March 2023. We surveyed 4,180 people — including 1,176 lawyers, 1,239 law students and 1,765 consumers — across the U.S. Among the lawyers surveyed, the audience was broken into three segments: (1) Small Law Firms (62% of respondents); (2) Large Law Firms (22%); and (3) Corporate (16%).
The survey found that lawyers are significantly more aware of generative AI than the general population (86% vs. 57%), 36% of lawyers have used a generative AI tool either personally or professionally, and nearly one in five (19%) are in fact already using these tools in their legal practice.
When we asked lawyers to identify the specific areas in which they perceive the most potential to use generative AI in their work, the top five answers were as follows:
Other responses included writing emails (30%), conducting due diligence (27%), improving work quality (25%), understanding new legal concepts (19%) and developing litigation strategies (11%).
Lawyers currently have mixed feelings about how they view the impact of generative AI tools on their profession. A majority (62%) see it as a mixed bag, with both potential and drawbacks, while roughly the same number of respondents expressed positive sentiments (15%) as negative sentiments (11%), and the other 12% are on the fence at this point.
It is clear from the survey results that the vast majority of lawyers have concerns about the ethical implications of generative AI on the practice of law. One-third of respondents (33%) expressed significant or fundamental concerns about the ethics of these tools in the profession and another 54% said they have some questions or concerns.
In spite of these concerns, lawyers are resigned to the inevitability of using generative AI in the legal profession. Overall, our survey found that 39% of lawyers believe generative AI tools will have either a “significant” or “transformative” impact on the practice of law, another 50% predict some degree of impact, and just 11% anticipate no impact from these tools.
LexisNexis has been leading the way in the development of legal AI tools for years, working to provide lawyers with products that leverage the power of AI technology to support key legal tasks while establishing important safeguards and data control programs to make sure that we are abiding by responsible AI development principles.
We’re now pioneering the use of generative AI for legal research, analysis and the presentation of results, with a focus on how these tools can enable legal professionals to achieve better outcomes and advance the rule of law. We invite you to join us on this journey by following our Legal Artificial Intelligence Tools web page, where we will share more information about these AI-powered solutions and how they can support the practice of law.
We will continue to be on the leading edge of the conversation in the legal industry about the exciting potential and serious challenges associated with this fast-moving phenomenon of generative AI tools. In our next article, we will take a closer look at some of the disturbing risks that many lawyers have discovered when using the current generation of generative AI tools for legal research and why some law firms are taking decisive steps to restrict their use at this time.
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