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Artificial Intelligence: A help or threat to contemporary education. Should students be forced to think and do their tasks independently?

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Abstract

Technological progress has a significant impact on higher education and increases the popularity of artificial intelligence technologies in universities of different countries. This research was based at Tianshui Normal University in China. The authors examined the impact of an interactive learning environment based on artificial intelligence in the context of the preservation of important cognitive functions such as IQ as well as long-term and short-term memory. This research enrolled 539 s-year students. The experimental group (N = 322) consisted of students of the Faculty of Music, who have been studying music for more than one year using artificial intelligence technologies such as mobile applications, video games, music simulators, etc. The control group (N = 217) consisted of students of the Faculty of Arts, who never used the potential of the interactive educational environment during their studies. Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS-IV) was chosen as the main method. The test results showed that students in the control and experimental groups averaged the same normal intelligence (97.61). At the same time, there was no significant intergroup difference on all four scales: verbal comprehension, perceptual thinking, working memory, and information processing speed (P ≥ 0.05). It has been found that students in both groups equally rarely reported problems in terms of long-term or short-term memory (P ≥ 0.05). The findings can be used to intensify the scientific discussion about the threats and developmental potential of artificial intelligence in higher education.

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Acknowledgements

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Funding

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Teacher Education, Tianshui Normal College, Tianshui Normal University, Tianshui, China

    Xiaohu Xie

  2. School of Marxism, Wuhan Institute of Technology, Wuhan, China

    Tao Wang

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  1. Xiaohu Xie
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  2. Tao Wang
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Contributions

X.X. and T.W. contributed equally to the experimentation. X.X. wrote and edited the article, designed the experiment. T.W. conducted the experiment, studied scientific literature about the topic. Both authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Tao Wang.

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Ethical approval

The authors declare that the work is written with due consideration of ethical standards. The study was conducted in accordance with the ethical principles approved by the Human Experiments Ethics Committee of Tianshui Normal University (Protocol no. 003 of 05.07.2022).

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Xie, X., Wang, T. Artificial Intelligence: A help or threat to contemporary education. Should students be forced to think and do their tasks independently?. Educ Inf Technol 29, 3097–3111 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639-023-11947-7

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