Higher Education Students’ Perceptions of GenAI Tools for Learning

Abstract

Students’ perceptions of tools with which they learn affect the outcomes of this learning. GenAI tools are new tools that have promise for students’ learning, especially higher education students. Examining students’ perceptions of GenAI tools as learning tools can help instructors better plan activities that utilize these tools in the higher education context. The present research considers four components of students’ perceptions of GenAI tools: efficiency, interaction, affect, and intention. To triangulate data, it combines the quantitative and the qualitative methodologies, by using a questionnaire and by conducting interviews. A total of 153 higher education students responded to the questionnaire, while 10 higher education students participated in the interview. The research results indicated that the means of affect, interaction, and efficiency were significantly medium, while the mean of intention was significantly high. The research findings showed that in efficiency, affect, and intention, male students had significantly higher perceptions of AI tools than female students, but in the interaction component, the two genders did not differ significantly. Moreover, the degree affected only the perception of interaction of higher education students, where the mean value of interaction was significantly different between B.A. and Ph.D. students in favor of Ph.D. students. Moreover, medium-technology-knowledge and high-technology-knowledge students differed significantly in their perceptions of working with AI tools in the interaction component only, where this difference was in favor of the high-technology-knowledge students. Furthermore, AI knowledge significantly affected efficiency, interaction, and affect of higher education students, where they were higher in favor of high-AI-knowledge students over low-AI-knowledge students, as well as in favor of medium-AI-knowledge students over low-AI-knowledge students.