Chatbot for Education: Benefits, Challenges and Opportunities

They anticipate workforce cuts in certain areas and large reskilling efforts to address shifting talent needs. Yet while the use of gen AI might spur the adoption of other AI tools, we see few meaningful increases in organizations’ adoption of these technologies. The percent of organizations adopting any AI tools has held steady since 2022, and adoption remains concentrated within a small number of business functions. Machines built in this way don’t possess any knowledge of previous events but instead only “react” to what is before them in a given moment. As a result, they can only perform certain advanced tasks within a very narrow scope, such as playing chess, and are incapable of performing tasks outside of their limited context.

Correspondingly, these tasks reflect that ECs may be potentially beneficial in fulfilling the three learning domains by providing a platform for information retrieval, emotional and motivational support, and skills development. Concerning the evaluation methods used to establish the validity of the approach, slightly more than a third of the chatbots used experiment with mostly significant results. The remaining chatbots were evaluated with evaluation studies (27.77%), questionnaires (27.77%), and focus groups (8.33%). The findings point to improved learning, high usefulness, and subjective satisfaction. The remaining articles (13 articles; 36.11%) present chatbot-driven chatbots that used an intent-based approach.

Microsoft was one of the first companies to provide a dedicated chat experience (well before Google’s Gemini and Search Generative Experiment). Copilt works best with the Microsoft Edge browser or Windows operating system. It uses OpenAI technologies combined with proprietary systems to retrieve live data from the web. Microsoft Copilot is an AI assistant infused with live web search results from Bing Search. Copilot represents the leading brand of Microsoft’s AI products, but you have probably heard of Bing AI (or Bing Chat), which uses the same base technologies.

Most importantly, chatbots played a critical role in the education field, in which most researchers (12 articles; 33.33%) developed chatbots used to teach computer science topics (Fig. 4). Only two articles partially addressed the interaction styles of chatbots. For instance, Winkler and Söllner (2018) classified the chatbots as flow or AI-based, while Cunningham-Nelson et al. (2019) categorized the chatbots as machine-learning-based or dataset-based.

So, keep in mind that chatbots are a supplement to your human agents, not a replacement. Chatbots can take orders straight from the chat or send the client directly to the checkout page to complete the purchase. This will minimize the effort a potential customer has to go through during a checkout. In turn, this reduces friction points before the sale and improves the user experience. Bots taking over some of the customer inquiries can have a positive impact on customer satisfaction as well as your representatives’ well-being. The agents won’t be stressed out trying to answer queries as quickly as possible, but will rather have time to focus on each request in-depth.

One of the principal benefits of PLS lies in its fewer constraints concerning sample size distribution and residuals relative to covariance-based structural equation techniques such as LISREL and AMOS, as highlighted by (Hair et al., 2021). Our analysis employed a three-step strategy, encompassing common method bias (CMB), the measurement model, and the structural model. I’ve tried using them to evaluate student essays, but it isn’t great at that. Conversational AI is revolutionizing how businesses across many sectors communicate with customers, and the use of chatbots across many industries is becoming more prevalent. A strategic plan is essential to organize and present this data through the chatbot without overwhelming the user.

Within just eight months of its launch in 2022, it has already amassed over 100 million users, setting new records for user and traffic growth. ChatGPT stands out among AI-powered chatbots used in education due to its advanced natural language processing capabilities and sophisticated language generation, enabling more natural and human-like conversations. It excels at capturing and retaining contextual information throughout interactions, leading to more coherent and contextually relevant conversations. Unlike some educational chatbots that follow predetermined paths or rely on predefined scripts, ChatGPT is capable of engaging in open-ended dialogue and adapting to various user inputs. It is evident that chatbot technology has a significant impact on overall learning outcomes.

Despite voicing concerns about their privacy, many individuals continue to disclose personal information or engage in activities that may compromise their privacy. However, in the context of AI technologies like ChatGPT, this study posits that privacy concerns may have a more pronounced impact. Particularly in an educational context, where sensitive academic information may be shared, privacy concerns can act as a deterrent, negatively influencing the behavioral intention to use the technology (H8). Rogers’ theory also highlights that these perceived benefits can significantly influence an individual’s intention to adopt the innovation.

Ensuring that the handover from bot to human is seamless is a challenge that requires careful design. We recommend using respond.io, an AI-powered customer conversation management software. You can start with a free trial and later upgrade to the plan that best suits your business needs. Chatbots can help foster a sense of community among online learners by connecting them with peers, facilitating group discussions, and providing support for collaborative projects. This can help create a more supportive learning environment, reducing the likelihood of students dropping out. Thus, the chatbot ensures that all potential students receive prompt and accurate information without overwhelming the support staff.

While students were largely satisfied with the answers given by the chatbot, they thought it lacked personalization and the human touch of real academic advisors. Finally, the chatbot discussed by (Verleger & Pembridge, 2018) was built upon a Q&A database related to a programming course. Nevertheless, because the tool did not produce answers to some questions, some students decided to abandon it and instead use standard search engines to find answers. Only four (11.11%) articles used chatbots that engage in user-driven conversations where the user controls the conversation and the chatbot does not have a premade response.

According to a Statista report, 44% of survey respondents are willing to switch to brands offer personalized messaging. Hiring new executives (who can support customers throughout the year) and appending other basic things for them can turn out to be highly expensive for the company. A Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) analysis was carried out to scrutinize the hypothesized interconnections among the constructs using Partial Least Squares (PLS).

What inspired you to explore the potential pedagogical usefulness of bots?

While there is much more to Jasper than its AI chatbot, it’s a tool worth using. Back when ChatGPT had a knowledge cut-off (it didn’t know that Covid happened, for instance), Jasper Chat was one of the first major solutions on the market to enrich its chatbot interactions with live data from search results. Now, this isn’t much of a competitive advantage anymore, but it shows how Jasper has been creating solutions for some of the biggest problems in AI. While the use of gen AI tools is spreading rapidly, the survey data doesn’t show that these newer tools are propelling organizations’ overall AI adoption. The share of organizations that have adopted AI overall remains steady, at least for the moment, with 55 percent of respondents reporting that their organizations have adopted AI. Less than a third of respondents continue to say that their organizations have adopted AI in more than one business function, suggesting that AI use remains limited in scope.

The increasing accessibility of generative AI tools has made it an in-demand skill for many tech roles. If you’re interested in learning to work with AI for your career, you might consider a free, beginner-friendly online program like Google’s Introduction to Generative AI. In this article, you’ll learn more about artificial intelligence, what it actually does, and different types of it. In the end, you’ll also learn about some of its benefits and dangers and explore flexible courses that can help you expand your knowledge of AI even further. To choose the right chatbot builder for your business, you should look into the features and functionalities each vendor provides.

Consider entering questions you ask your students into the tool to see what kind of responses are generated. If your educational institution is considering adopting an AI chatbot, why not schedule a demo or get in touch with our experts at Freshchat? They can answer any questions you have and guide you through the process of deploying the best-in-class educational chatbot and ensuring you use it to its full potential. If students do not connect with their learning, it affects their outcomes. Studies have shown that the relationship between students’ engagement in their learning material and their academic achievement is not to be ignored, with those who are more engaged achieving significantly better performance than those who are not.

Therefore, this section outlines the benefits of traditional chatbot use in education. AI aids researchers in developing systems that can collect student feedback by measuring how much students are able to understand the study material and be attentive during a study session. The way AI technology is booming in every sphere of life, the day when quality education will be more easily accessible is not far. There are multiple business dimensions in the education industry where chatbots are gaining popularity, such as online tutors, student support, teacher’s assistant, administrative tool, assessing and generating results.

Table 7 provides a summary of the primary advantages and drawbacks of each AIC, along with their correlation to the items in the CHISM model, which are indicated in parentheses. Future studies should explore chatbot localization, where a chatbot is customized based on the culture and context it is used in. Moreover, researchers should explore devising frameworks for designing and developing educational chatbots to guide educators to build usable and effective chatbots. Finally, researchers should explore EUD tools that allow non-programmer educators to design and develop educational chatbots to facilitate the development of educational chatbots.

However, a few participants pointed out that it was sufficient for them to learn with a human partner. The surveyed articles used different types of empirical evaluation to assess the effectiveness of chatbots in educational settings. In some instances, researchers combined multiple evaluation methods, possibly to strengthen the findings. Recently, chatbots have been utilized in various fields (Ramesh et al., 2017).

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These so-called “chatbots,” computer programs designed to simulate conversation with human users, have evolved rapidly in recent years. Furthermore, in regard to problems faced, it was observed that in the EC group, the perception transformed from collaboration issues towards communicative issues, whereas it was the opposite for the CT group. According to Kumar et al. (2021), collaborative learning has a symbiotic relationship with communication skills in project-based learning. This study identifies a need for more active collaboration in the EC group and commitment for the CT group.

Our education systems weren’t designed for students in the internet age. Zoomers grow up on smartphones and tablets, so technology is integral to all aspects of learning, from creating and delivering course materials to how these materials are absorbed and memorized. While the benefits of chatbots in education are significant, there are challenges to consider. Regular testing with real users and incorporating their feedback is critical to the success of your chatbot. Each iteration should aim to improve the user experience and streamline communication further.

If you want to encourage students to sign up for a webinar, an art class, or a class trip, this can all be automated through your chatbot. Chatbots can be deployed in this way to help significantly reduce admin time and costs and the need for human-to-human interaction. AI is transforming the student experiences and education industry, and you don’t want to be left behind. Adopt the latest AI Chatbot for education to provide your students with a stellar experience. Educational services change regularly, and inaccuracies could lead to issues with students or potential learners.

2 RQ2: What platforms do the proposed chatbots operate on?

Thirdly education chatbots can access examination data and student responses in order to perform automated assessments. The bots can then process this information on the instructor’s request to generate student-specific scorecards and provide learning gap insights. Subsequently, the chatbot named after the course code (QMT212) was designed as a teaching assistant for an instructional design course. It was targeted to be used as a task-oriented (Yin et al., 2021), content curating, and long-term EC (10 weeks) (Følstad et al., 2019).

EC studies have primarily focused on language learning, programming, and health courses, implying that EC application and the investigation of learning outcomes have not been investigated in various educational domains and levels of education. According to Kumar and Silva (2020), acceptance, facilities, and skills are still are a significant challenge to students and instructors. Similarly, designing and adapting chatbots into existing learning systems is often taxing (Luo & Gonda, 2019) as instructors sometimes have limited competencies and Chat GPT strategic options in fulfilling EC pedagogical needs (Sandoval, 2018). Moreover, the complexity of designing and capturing all scenarios of how a user might engage with a chatbot also creates frustrations in interaction as expectations may not always be met for both parties (Brandtzaeg & Følstad, 2018). Hence, while ECs as conversational agents may have been projected to substitute learning platforms in the future (Følstad & Brandtzaeg, 2017), much is still to be explored from stakeholders’ viewpoint in facilitating such intervention.

One of the key reasons chatbots are becoming popular is that chatbots are easy to implement. In most cases, it is just a quick install, and once done, visitors can start interacting with them. Although a few platforms can be a little complex when compared to others, it isn’t hard to set them up.

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Yellow.ai is an excellent conversational AI platform vendor that can help you automate your business processes and deliver a world-class customer experience. They can guide you through the process of deploying an educational chatbot and using it to its full potential. Learning performance is defined as the students’ combined scores accumulated from the project-based learning activities in this study. Henceforth, we speculated that EC might influence the need for cognition as it aids in simplifying learning tasks (Ciechanowski et al., 2019), especially for teamwork. Chatbot technology has evolved rapidly over the last 60 years, partly thanks to modern advances in Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Machine Learning (ML) and the availability of Large Language Models (LLMs). Today chatbots can understand natural language, respond to user input, and provide feedback in the form of text or audio (text-based and voice-enabled).

For example, a client using a chatbot to order a pizza can choose which one they want, the size, any add-ons, and then get sent straight to the checkout page with their order ready to be paid for. Hit the ground running – Master Tidio quickly with our extensive resource library. Learn about features, customize your experience, and find out how to set up integrations and use our apps. Discover how this Shopify store used Tidio to offer better service, recover carts, and boost sales. Chatbots are constantly improving with updates, making them more accurate, precise, intuitive, and react to specific queries in a better manner.

• It cites its sources, is very fast, and is reasonably reliable (as far as AI goes).
• His research focuses on public policy toward science, technology, and medicine, encompassing a number of areas, including pharmaceutical development, genetic engineering, models for regulatory reform, precision medicine, and the emergence of new viral diseases.
• The current study seeks to shed light on this crucial aspect, aiming to provide a nuanced comprehension of the array of factors that influence university students’ behavioral intentions and patterns towards utilizing ChatGPT for their educational pursuits.
• Nonetheless, the existing review studies have not concentrated on the chatbot interaction type and style, the principles used to design the chatbots, and the evidence for using chatbots in an educational setting.

Undoubtedly, instructors need to provide guidelines to students about the appropriate and inappropriate uses of artificial intelligence tools. However, instructors can also model and encourage productive and positive uses of artificial intelligence and help students see its value. Chatbots have introduced significant challenges to academic integrity in education. As chatbots become more accessible to everyday users, educators have expressed concerns about students using them to generate answers to questions on tests and assignments. Because chatbots are designed to understand and produce natural language input, they can respond to questions in ways that make it difficult to distinguish chatbot-generated content from student-generated responses.

They are anticipated to engage with humans using voice recognition, comprehend human emotions, and navigate social interactions. Consequently, their potential impact on future education is substantial. You can foun additiona information about ai customer service and artificial intelligence and NLP. This includes activities such as establishing educational objectives, developing teaching methods and curricula, and conducting assessments (Latif et al., 2023). Considering Microsoft’s extensive integration efforts of ChatGPT into its products (Rudolph et al., 2023; Warren, 2023), it is likely that ChatGPT will become widespread soon.

Furthermore, there is a need for understanding how users experience chatbots (Brandtzaeg & Følstad, 2018), especially when they are not familiar with such intervention (Smutny & Schreiberova, 2020). Conversely, due to the novelty of ECs, the author has not found any studies pertaining to ECs in design education, project-based learning, and focusing on teamwork outcomes. Moreover, according to Cunningham-Nelson et al. (2019), one of the key benefits of EC is that it can support a large number of users simultaneously, which is undeniably an added advantage as it reduces instructors’ workload.

When interacting with students, chatbots have taken various roles such as teaching agents, peer agents, teachable agents, and motivational agents (Chhibber & Law, 2019; Baylor, 2011; Kerry et al., 2008). Teaching agents play the role of human teachers and can present instructions, illustrate examples, ask questions (Wambsganss et al., 2020), and provide immediate feedback (Kulik & Fletcher, 2016). On the other hand, peer agents serve as learning mates for students to encourage peer-to-peer interactions.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Student Assistants in the Classroom: Designing Chatbots to Support Student Success

By creating a sense of connection and personalized interaction, these AI chatbots forge stronger bonds between students and their studies. Learners feel more immersed and invested in their educational journey, driven by the desire to explore new topics and uncover intriguing insights. Furthermore, the feedbacks also justified why other variables such as the need for cognition, perception of learning, creativity, self-efficacy, and motivational belief did not show significant differences.

This study, however, uses different classifications (e.g., “teaching agent”, “peer agent”, “motivational agent”) supported by the literature in Chhibber and Law (2019), Baylor (2011), and Kerlyl et al. (2006). Other studies such as (Okonkwo and Ade-Ibijola, 2021; Pérez et al., 2020) partially covered this dimension by mentioning that chatbots can be teaching or service-oriented. A conversational benefits of chatbots in education agent can hold a discussion with students in a variety of ways, ranging from spoken (Wik & Hjalmarsson, 2009) to text-based (Chaudhuri et al., 2009) to nonverbal (Wik & Hjalmarsson, 2009; Ruttkay & Pelachaud, 2006). Similarly, the agent’s visual appearance can be human-like or cartoonish, static or animated, two-dimensional or three-dimensional (Dehn & Van Mulken, 2000).

Moreover, the relationship between perceived benefits and behavioral intention (H7) is also consistent with TAM. According to Davis (1989), when users perceive a system as beneficial, they are more likely to form positive intentions to use it. Thus, the more students perceive the benefits of using ChatGPT, such as improved learning outcomes, personalized learning experiences, and increased engagement, the stronger their intention to use ChatGPT. ChatGPT’s unique features manifest a range of enabling factors that can significantly influence its adoption among university students. One such factor is the self-learning attribute that empowers the AI to progressively enhance its performance (Rijsdijk et al., 2007). This feature aligns with the ongoing learning journey of students, potentially fostering a symbiotic learning environment.

Authentic learning happens when a person is trying to do or figure out something that they care about — much more so than the problem sets or design challenges that we give them as part of their coursework. It’s in those moments that learners could benefit from a timely piece of advice or feedback, or a suggested “move” or method to try. So I’m currently working on what I call a “cobot” — a hybrid between a rule-based and an NLP bot chatbot — that can collaborate with humans when they need it and as they pursue their own goals.

Moreover, other web-based chatbots such as EnglishBot (Ruan et al., 2021) help students learn a foreign language. Additionally, this study’s emphasis on the self-learning capabilities of ChatGPT as a significant determinant of knowledge acquisition and application among students is a significant contribution to the existing body of literature. Previous research primarily centered on the chatbot’s features and functionalities (Haleem et al., 2022; Hocutt et al., 2022), leaving the learning capabilities of these AI systems underexplored. By focusing on the self-learning feature of ChatGPT, this study has expanded the discourse on AI capabilities and their impact on knowledge dissemination in the educational context. The instrument for this study was carefully crafted, leveraging a structured questionnaire to assess the influential factors in university students’ behavioral intentions and actual use of ChatGPT. Items in the questionnaire were adopted and adapted from the existing literature, ensuring their validity and relevance in examining the constructs of interest.

For hypothesis testing and path coefficient determination, this study employed a bootstrapping procedure, setting the subsample size at 5000. Overall, the structural model describes approximately 38.0% of the variability in behavior. The first section collected demographic information about the respondents, including their age, gender, and field of study, to capture the heterogeneity of the sample. The second section was dedicated to evaluating the constructs related to the study, each measured using multiple items. Visual cues such as progress bars, checkmarks, or typing indicators can help users understand where they are in the conversation and what to expect next.

Then, get the most out of your bot by putting it on the right page of your website and giving it personality. This step ties in with listing your needs—a customer service chatbot should be rated by a different metric compared to a lead generation https://chat.openai.com/ bot. For example, if you implement the chatbot to increase sales, your metrics should relate to sales, such as conversion rate. Look at the features provided by the platform and see which vendor has the features important for your company.

This aligns with Davis’s proposition that perceived usefulness positively influences behavioral intention to use a technology (Davis, 1989). The model asserts that the AI’s self-learning capability influences knowledge acquisition and application, which in turn impact individual users. Personalization of the AI and the novelty value it offers are also predicted to have substantial effects on the perceived benefits, influencing the behavioral intention to use AI, culminating in actual behavior. The model also takes into account potential negative influences such as perceived risk, technophobia, and feelings of guilt on the behavioral intention to use the AI. The last two constructs in the model, behavioral intention and innovativeness, are anticipated to influence the actual behavior of the AI. When you think of advancements in technology, edtech might not be the first thing that pops into your head.

It has a compelling free version of the Gemini model capable of plenty. Its paid version features Gemini Advanced, which gives access to Google’s best AI models that directly compete with GPT-4. Chatsonic is great for those who want a ChatGPT replacement and AI writing tools. It includes an AI writer, AI photo generator, and chat interface that can all be customized. If you create professional content and want a top-notch AI chat experience, you will enjoy using Chatsonic + Writesonic.

• Students that struggle with specific materials can be provided individualized learning materials based on the information collected.
• Chatbots can help boost student engagement by being a constant presence.
• Among these, privacy concerns stand out as paramount (Lund & Wang, 2023; McCallum, 2023).
• There is also a bias towards empirically evaluated articles as we only selected articles that have an empirical evaluation, such as experiments, evaluation studies, etc.
• Convergent Validity is the extent to which a measure correlates positively with alternate measures of the same construct.

Therefore, one group pretest–posttest design was applied for both groups in measuring learning outcomes, except for learning performance and perception of learning which only used the post-test design. The EC is usually deployed for the treatment class one day before the class except for EC6 and EC10, which were deployed during the class. Such a strategy was used to ensure that the instructor could guide the students the next day if there were any issues. Three categories of research gaps were identified from empirical findings (i) learning outcomes, (ii) design issues, and (iii) assessment and testing issues.

This reinforces the importance of AI tools in achieving task completion and boosting productivity. Nevertheless, the variance in individual impact explained by these two factors indicates that other elements may also be at play. This study hypothesizes that these guilt feelings can negatively influence students’ behavioral intention to use ChatGPT (H10). That is, students who experience guilt feelings related to using ChatGPT might be less inclined to use this tool for their learning. This underscores the importance of considering emotional factors, in addition to cognitive and behavioral factors, when exploring the determinants of technology use in an educational setting. The privacy paradox theory, formulated by Barnes (2006), provides insight into the intriguing contradiction that exists between individuals’ expressed concerns about privacy and their actual online behavior.