Transformative Effects of ChatGPT on Modern Education: Emerging Era of AI Chatbots

TL;DR

ChatGPT has the potential to significantly transform education by providing instructional support and fostering engagement, but challenges like inaccuracies and ethical concerns must be addressed for effective integration.

Contribution

This paper offers an early evaluation of ChatGPT's capabilities and challenges in education, highlighting its potential and limitations in the sector.

Findings

ChatGPT performs variably across subjects like finance, coding, and maths.

It can assist educators with content creation and student engagement.

Limitations include hallucinations and potential misuse for plagiarism.

Abstract

ChatGPT, an AI-based chatbot, was released to provide coherent and useful replies based on analysis of large volumes of data. In this article, leading scientists, researchers and engineers discuss the transformative effects of ChatGPT on modern education. This research seeks to improve our knowledge of ChatGPT capabilities and its use in the education sector, identifying potential concerns and challenges. Our preliminary evaluation concludes that ChatGPT performed differently in each subject area including finance, coding and maths. While ChatGPT has the ability to help educators by creating instructional content, offering suggestions and acting as an online educator to learners by answering questions and promoting group work, there are clear drawbacks in its use, such as the possibility of producing inaccurate or false data and circumventing duplicate content (plagiarism) detectors where originality is essential. The often reported hallucinations within Generative AI in general, and also relevant for ChatGPT, can render its use of limited benefit where accuracy is essential. What ChatGPT lacks is a stochastic measure to help provide sincere and sensitive communication with its users. Academic regulations and evaluation practices used in educational institutions need to be updated, should ChatGPT be used as a tool in education. To address the transformative effects of ChatGPT on the learning environment, educating teachers and students alike about its capabilities and limitations will be crucial.