Opportunities and Challenges of ChatGPT in Academia: A Conceptual Analysis

Abstract

ChatGPT, also known as GPT-3, is an AI-based natural language model that has gained a lot of attention in recent times due to its potential applications in various sectors including academia, health, and the like. This AI model is able to offer various automated tasks in the academic sector which were traditionally performed by humans consuming a huge time and effort. This short communication aims to explore the possible opportunities and challenges of ChatGPT in the academic domain. To attain this objective, data are collected from online resources and analyzed following the noticing-collecting-thinking model. As outcomes, the opportunities and challenges of this AI model are described into four concerns of academic domain including research, education, personal skill development and social.

The impact of Artificial Intelligence in academia: Views of Turkish academics on ChatGPT

“…According to academics, ChatGPT can provide language support to researchers to understand literature in different languages and/or review their own translations for errors. This advantage is also recognized in previous studies as one of the academic benefits of ChatGPT [ 9 , 10 , 45 ]. Academics suggest that ChatGPT can also be used as an educational tool to facilitate access to sources and information for teaching purposes.…”

“…Academics suggest that ChatGPT can also be used as an educational tool to facilitate access to sources and information for teaching purposes. Islam and Islam [ 10 ] also acknowledge the contribution of ChatGPT in this regard. Therefore, academics consider ChatGPT as a tool that can make their professional lives easier, save time and increase efficiency [ [1] , [2] , [3] , [4] , 10 , 23 , 37 , [44] , [45] , [46] , [47] , [48] , [49] , [50] , [51] ].…”

“…Academics are skeptical about the accuracy and impartiality of the information obtained from ChatGPT. Risks associated with ChatGPT include biased information [ 10 , 45 ], which can make the content's reliability controversial [ 11 ], the potential to reflect and disseminate erroneous or biased information in the education process [ 9 ], the potential to generate scientific misinformation by creating misleading or incorrect content [ 61 ], the spread of disinformation and misinformation [ 10 ], the perpetuation of bias [ 47 ], and the potential for misusing concepts [ 49 ].…”

“…Therefore, understanding the impact of chatbots such as ChatGPT on academia and the perception of academics towards these technologies is crucial. However, scientific articles on the impact of ChatGPT on academia have generally remained at the theoretical level, and discussions have aroused on the responses given by ChatGPT itself [ [9] , [10] , [11] ]. In this context, it is difficult to come across with a study on academics' experiences.…”

ChatGPT: Literate or intelligent about UN sustainable development goals?

“…Furthermore, Else [ 38 ] the challenge of distinguishing between AI-generated and original abstracts, stirring fears of plagiarism and academic integrity issues in higher education [ 39 ]. Islam & Islam [ 40 ] pointed out the potential benefits and negative impacts of ChatGPT with respect to education, research, personal skill development and society. Therefore, the ethical and practical implications of AI and ChatGPT in education continue to generate debate, and research on their adoption is still in its nascent stages [ 41 , 42 ].…”