Words like ‘raise’, ‘improve’ and ‘advance’ are perfectly fine, but according to ChatGPT, they are far less desirable than ‘elevate’.
I admit it’s a nice-sounding word, and the fact the tool is able to use words metaphorically shows strong language learning skills, but we can all agree that ChatGPT is really testing our patience with the relentless repetition.
It turns out that ‘elevate’ is trapped in the eye of a perfect AI storm due to the nature of the word and the nature of most ChatGPT prompts.
The ultimate placeholder
As with all the common ChatGPT words, they happen to be commonly used human words too, which means the chatbot’s artificial neural network picked them up via pattern recognition.
You also have to remember that words which have existed for a long time and appear in a wide range of contexts are valuable commodities to Large Language Models like ChatGPT because it gives them a rich source of material to train on.
Elevate is about as versatile as a word can get:
- “Using a crane, they were able to elevate the heavy machinery to the top floor of the building.
- “Reading poetry has the power to elevate one’s mood and transport them to a place of tranquility.”
- “Engaging in thought-provoking discussions can elevate our understanding of complex issues.”
- “His promotion to manager elevated him to a position of greater responsibility within the company.”
- “Incorporating sustainable practices can elevate the quality of products and reduce environmental impact.”
From physical elevation to emotional elevation to status elevation, the word ‘elevate’ has licence to be used in nearly any scenario where your life is enhanced, making it the ideal placeholder when ChatGPT needs to output generic text without straining its processing power.
Elevating your ChatGPT prompts
The other half of the explanation for the high frequency of this word lies in what people use ChatGPT for. In short, elevate is a very common ChatGPT verb because it’s precisely what users want from the tool!
People go to ChatGPT to solve problems, not worsen them. If problem-solving and improvement-making are the basis of most prompts, then most responses will contain positive words like ‘elevate’, since this is literally what the goal is.
Nobody asks ChatGPT for cooking ingredients and instructions for a vomit-inducing cake—you want to elevate the taste of the cake.
Nobody asks ChatGPT to write an essay that is guaranteed to be graded poorly—you want to elevate the written quality of the essay.
Nobody asks ChatGPT for paint color suggestions that will worsen your interior design scheme—you want to elevate the interior design.
The chatbot receives billions of prompts designed to improve the user’s life in some way, shape or form and only has a handful of words available to describe said improvements, so it’s stuck in a vicious cycle in this sense.
The impact of this common ChatGPT word on SEO
If you use AI-generated texts as content to be published online, you need to be careful in terms of the presence of ‘elevate’ and the locations in which it appears, or risk having your content downgraded by search engines.
Our own research on ChatGPT-generated articles found that ‘elevate’ has a habit of appearing more than once in the same article. It may show up in the main body as well as in titles and headings.
Give your content the best possible chance of getting indexed and ranked by limiting the word to a single use. And while you’re at it, consider rephrasing the introduction if ChatGPT insists on “delving into” the topic at hand.
Summary
ChatGPT uses the word ‘elevate’ a lot for two reasons.
Firstly, it’s a ubiquitous word in everyday English and fits into many different contexts, making it a very safe and reliable word to employ in ChatGPT’s responses.
Secondly, the word nicely sums up what most people want from the tool. They want ChatGPT to show them how to do something better and therefore words like elevate are essentially given endless opportunities for selection in generative AI texts.