Last week I posted about the mental and physical toll of AI-intensive coding sessions.
- Running three+ terminals at once
- Twelve-hour days that feel productive until they don't
- The disappearing gaps where your brain used to recover
I started calling it AI exhaustion. Turns out there's now research for it. Harvard Business Review just published a study of nearly 1,500 workers that gives it a name: "AI brain fry."
The finding that stood out the most:
- When AI replaces routine tasks, burnout goes down. But mental fatigue doesn't. AI takes away the tedious stuff and replaces it with nonstop decision-making. You're not doing less work. You're doing harder work, with fewer breaks.
- They also found a productivity cliff around three simultaneous AI tools. One to two boosts output. Two to three still helps, but less. After three, productivity drops. I landed on that same limit on my own.
Now there's data behind it. Definitely worth the read for both managers and devs.
