In this blog, Rosemarie McIlwhan (Heriot-Watt University), Kirsty Kiezebrink and Sara Preston (University of Aberdeen), Louise Drumm (Edinburgh Napier University) and Natalie Lafferty and Emma Duke-Williams (University of Dundee) share findings from their recent research on staff and student perspectives on Generative AI.

Introduction

The Universities of Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh Napier and Heriot-Watt undertook an AdvanceHE Collaborative Development Fund project conducting research to understand what may influence students and staff when deciding to engage, or not, with GenAI tools and how they can be supported to use these tools responsibly, ethically and effectively. We’re grateful to everyone who took the time to share the research survey, focus groups or otherwise participate in or support the research project so far.

Project outputs and findings

The AHE project outputs are now available on the AdvanceHE website and the Open Data Set is available on Pure.

Staff and student acceptance of GenAI tools in higher education (infographic)

Research report key findings include:

  • Gen AI Adoption Varies with 30% of participants using GenAI tools frequently, but 43% rarely or never engage with it. Academic staff are more hesitant than students and professional services staff.
  • 57% of GenAI users leverage it for summarising, explaining concepts, and generating ideas. However, concerns about accuracy, ethics, and bias remain.
  • Professional services staff were the most frequent users of GenAI.
  • Academic staff perceived the least productivity gains from GenAI.
  • Many academic staff believe GenAI use could lead to academic misconduct, but only a minority of students share this view.
  • Most students think it is unacceptable for academic staff to use GenAI for marking and feedback, but were accepting of GenAI being used for other aspects of their roles.
  • While most universities have GenAI policies, 47% of students responders were unaware of them, highlighting a need for better communication.
  • Training needs were identified for both staff and students on fact-checking, ethical use, and prompt engineering to use AI effectively.

 

What’s Next?

As AI continues to evolve, universities must balance innovation with academic integrity, providing clear guidance and upskilling opportunities for both staff and students.

We encourage institutions to use the infographic and resource cards to facilitate conversations with staff and students to explore their views on GenAI and discuss how to address the use of GenAI within Higher Education in an ethical, responsible and effective manner.

The resource cards for exploring the use of GenAI tools in higher education and infographic are Creative Commons licenced so if you reuse, remix or share these please do so within the terms of licence. We’d love to hear feedback on how you’ve used them.

If you’ve questions or feedback about the research or the outputs please get in touch at cad@abdn.ac.uk.

 

Credits:

This post was originally published by Kirsty Kiezebrink on LinkedIn.

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay