How to Avoid Sounding Like AI in Your Writing

Adjusting your writing style with minor changes can help keep AI detectors from identifying it as machine-generated. To enhance the human touch in your writing, steer clear of repetitive sentence structures. Incorporating personal stories, using contractions, and mixing up your sentence lengths can bring a sense of authenticity and make your writing more engaging.

The decision to incorporate AI into your writing process is completely up to you. Yet, few things are as exasperating as having your original, human-crafted work mistakenly identified as AI-generated content. As someone with a background in academic proofreading and English teaching, I’ve learned several techniques to help you refine your writing style and steer clear of that robotic tone. Let me share some insights that can help you achieve the same.

AI detection operates by identifying specific patterns that indicate a lack of human-like thought processes in writing. This involves the use of classifiers that sort text based on factors such as usage, grammar, style, and tone. Additionally, embeddings are utilized to analyze the relationships between words, while perplexity measures gauge the randomness of the text. Finally, burstiness measures are employed to examine the variations in sentence structures and lengths.

So, making small tweaks in these areas will help us to make sure we’re not writing in a way that AI detection software would highlight as being non-human.

Take note: The key thing to note when considering whether your writing sounds like it’s produced by AI is that AI detectors don’t all necessarily work the same way, and there’s no evidence that any are reliable. The hints in this guide will go a long way to making your writing sound more human-like, though following the tips will help improve your writing quality in general.

Avoid Repeated Patterns

Repeated patterns can be useful in certain scenarios, such as for emphasis. For example, notice how politicians often use three-part slogans to add gravitas to their speeches. However, modifying the sequences of your words will help you to sound more human.

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One way to do this is to use different words at the start of your sentences. For example, if you repeatedly start with ‘The’, it’s likely that the next word will be a noun or an adjective, and that will largely dictate how the rest of your sentence will be structured. Instead, start some sentences with verbs or adjectives—indeed, this is a handy tip for more interesting writing more generally.

Overall, focusing on how you start your sentences will go a long way to letting AI detection know that you are, indeed, a human.

When you opt for the initial term that pops into your head, chances are that numerous others have chosen the same term, making it easier for AI detection tools to identify its connections with other words. British lexicographer Susie Dent notes that the typical active vocabulary of an adult English speaker consists of around 20,000 words. However, if we take the time to consider different options, our vocabulary can expand to 40,000 words. This indicates that by pausing to think of a substitute word, you could significantly enhance your likelihood of steering clear of a false positive.

The key is not to overdo it. If you use too many synonyms, your work will sound unnatural, and you might lose your intended meaning. Similarly, you can right-click a word in Microsoft Word to see suggested alternatives, but make sure you choose a word that accurately fits the context.

Rectifying this as you type might end up taking too long and might disrupt your flow. If this is the case, wait until you proofread your work. You’re more likely to spot mundane or repeated words when you read your work from start to finish. Even more usefully, you can get your computer to read your document back to you, which might help you spot other things you want to tweak.

To create engaging content, it’s essential to vary sentence lengths and structures. AI-generated writing often features sentences that are strikingly similar in both length and form. For instance, consider this passage about dogs:

Dogs, scientifically classified as Canis lupus familiaris, are domesticated mammals belonging to the Canidae family. Renowned for their loyalty and companionship, they come in a multitude of breeds, each showcasing distinct traits and characteristics. Over time, dogs have been selectively bred for numerous roles, such as herding, hunting, guarding, and providing companionship. Their deep connection with humans has earned them the title of “man’s best friend,” highlighting their remarkable ability to perceive and respond to human emotions. Communication among dogs occurs through a mix of vocal sounds, body movements, and facial cues, underscoring their social nature.

In this example, you’ll notice that four out of five sentences fall within a similar word count range of 13 to 19 words. Additionally, the writing tends to feel monotonous, and lacking in structural diversity. Repeatedly starting sentences with the same words further contributes to this uniformity.

2. To enhance the quality of your writing, it’s crucial to mix up sentence lengths and structures. AI-generated text often suffers from a lack of variety, as seen in this description of dogs:

The dog, a domesticated mammal from the Canidae family, is scientifically known as Canis lupus familiaris. These animals are celebrated for their loyalty and companionship, with a wide array of breeds that possess unique traits. Throughout history, dogs have been bred for various functions, including herding, hunting, guarding, and simply being companions. Their strong bond with humans has led to the affectionate title of “man’s best friend,” reflecting their ability to empathize with human emotions. Dogs express themselves through vocalizations, body language, and facial expressions, which makes them incredibly social creatures.

In this passage, you’ll find that four out of five sentences are quite similar in length, ranging from 13 to 19 words. This results in a somewhat monotonous reading experience, compounded by the repetitive sentence beginnings that we discussed earlier.

This simply isn’t how most humans communicate, whether in speech or writing. We use varied sentence lengths, naturally structure things in certain ways to add emphasis or provide more detail, and generally add more interest to what we output. It comes as no surprise that, when the paragraph above is re-inserted into AI detection software, it shows as being 100% machine-produced.

So, reorganizing your sentences into shorter and longer ones will not only help you avoid false positives but also make your writing sound more interesting.

Include Personal Anecdotes  (Avoid Sounding Like AI in Your Writing)

AI writing tools use large language models (LLMs) to produce their output. LLMs contain parameters and are trained on large data sets, such as books, websites, articles, journals, and others, to “learn” how language works. As a result, including anecdotes, lived experiences, or individualized language adds a personal touch to your writing that AI would struggle to replicate, which, in turn, means that it’s less likely to be flagged by detection software as artificially generated.

Even if whoever is reading or assessing your work doesn’t plan to run it through a detector, adopting a personal approach has other benefits. For example, take Google’s EEAT (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) principle, which helps the search engine determine which search results to prioritize. If you’re writing online, sharing unique experiences and incorporating authenticity into your writing will boost your EEAT rating, meaning you’re more likely to get more hits on your website. On a more basic level, if your writing is more personal, it’s more likely to be more engaging.

“use-contractions”>Use Contractions (Avoid Sounding Like AI in Your Writing)

Shortening some of your words with apostrophes—like using “she’s” instead of “she is”—adds a more conversational tone to your writing and, as a result, will read less robotically.

Whether you choose to follow this tip depends on the context of what you’re writing, however. If you’re crafting a formal academic thesis, for example, you might be advised to avoid shortening your words in this way. On the other hand, contractions will appear less out of place in a blog post, an informal website article, or an email these are all genres of writing where being more chatty could be deemed more favourable. Either way, if you do choose to employ contractions, do so sparingly.

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Adding to fine-tuning your writing style to showcase your human touch, there are several other measures you can adopt. For instance, consider sharing previous drafts of your projects, maintaining a detailed log of your sources, recording your work process on screen, and utilizing tools that monitor version history. These practices will reinforce your authenticity and help you address any accusations regarding the originality of your work.