v2026.1CASRAI Dictionary 714 entries across 20 domains · CC-BY 4.0714 entries · CC-BY 4.0

Dictionary termTrack AStablev2026.2

Generative AI

Artificial intelligence systems whose primary output is novel content (text, images, audio, video, code, or structured data) produced by sampling from a learned distribution, as distinct from discriminative AI systems whose output is a classification, score, or decision over existing inputs.

ByCASRAI Editorial Board

· Last updated 21 May 2026

Examples

Worked examples

Is an instance
ChatGPT producing a paragraph
Is an instance
DALL-E producing an image
Is an instance
GitHub Copilot producing code

Counter-examples

Looks similar, but isn't

Not an instance
A logistic-regression model that classifies tumours from imaging features (discriminative, not generative)

Editorial commentary

The disclosure-relevant distinction is that generative AI produces artefacts that can be confused with human-authored work, requiring transparency about provenance. Discriminative AI (e.g., a diagnostic classifier) raises different governance issues (bias, validation) but not authorship.

References

NIST AI Risk Management Framework Generative AI Profile (2024)
EU AI Act (2024)

Also known as

GenAI · Generative artificial intelligence

Machine-readable encodings

Use in your systems

JATS XML <role> element

xml

<role vocab="credit"
      vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/"
      vocab-term="Generative AI"
      vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/generative-ai" />

Schema.org DefinedTerm (JSON-LD)

json

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "DefinedTerm",
  "name": "Generative AI",
  "identifier": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/generative-ai",
  "description": "Artificial intelligence systems whose primary output is novel content (text, images, audio, video, code, or structured data) produced by sampling from a learned distribution, as distinct from discriminative AI systems whose output is a classification, score, or decision over existing inputs.",
  "inDefinedTermSet": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/domain/generative-ai-use-and-disclosure/",
  "url": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/generative-ai",
  "sameAs": [
    "GenAI",
    "Generative artificial intelligence"
  ],
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
}

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