The Long-Term Impact of ChatGPT on University Students’ Academic Writing Skills

Abstract

This research was conducted with the objective of investigate the long term impact of using ChatGPT in students' writing ability in terms of critical thinking, originality, and academic integrity. A qualitative approach using a descriptive interpretive case study design was adopted. The participants in this research are 10 EFL learners who have been using ChatGPT for more than a year for writing. Data was collected by semi-structured interviews, documents (i.e., ChatGPT interaction screenshots, students' writings), and student writings. Data analysis was conducted based on Miles, Huberman and Saldana's interactive model of data reduction, data display and conclusion drawing. The findings suggest that ChatGPT produces an 'all or nothing' affect on writing ability. Efficiency of the students in completing the task, enhancement of the text structure, fluency of students' language, and generating ideas is developed, on the contrary, overreliance on the usage of the model led to students' diminished ability of critical thinking, originality, and self reliance on writing tasks. Respondents' responses indicate students have a perception on ethical usage of AI; for instance, transparency, extensive proofreading and students as the actual authors are acknowledged. In the meanwhile, respondents' attitude towards ChatGPT also undergoes change with the change of AI advancement and institution policy. Therefore, in order to benefit the learning and instruction processes more efficiently, students should be guided on using ChatGPT responsibly and critically rather than having students' writing standards decreased..