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Critical thinking is a core goal of higher education, with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development citing it as (p. 4). With the arrival of generative AI (GenAI), there have been understandable concerns that its use may threaten this acquisition. But using GenAI in academic work doesn’t automatically preclude the possibility to think critically – rather the issue at stake is whether students choose to do it.

Let’s take an example of two students who approach the same task of writing an essay with GenAI in different ways.

Student A constructs arguments for the essay based on their reading and notes and then tells the GenAI chatbot to interrogate these arguments and challenge their reasoning. This interaction provokes the student to reflect more deeply on their assumptions about the essay topic and strengthen their arguments.

Student B asks the GenAI chatbot to generate relevant arguments to include in an essay and then to structure them into a plan. The student drafts the essay based on this plan, adding relevant details from their lectures which they know their tutors will be looking for.

If developing critical thinking is our goal, Student A’s strategy is more pedagogically valuable. But does the current higher education context make this clear? Both of these students end up with an essay they can submit. The hope is that the cognitive effort put in by Student A will be visible and rewarded, but that outcome is not guaranteed. Tutors are struggling to identify AI-generated work (Waltzer et al., 2024) and although more process-oriented assessment is on the agenda (Corbin et al., 2025), these changes will take time to implement.

‘The irony is that it is critical thinking, along with creativity, which will be the most valuable currency graduates can offer in an AI-enabled future.’

It could be further argued that Student B’s strategy is justified, as it shows critical decision-making based on an effort vs reward calculation. Reflecting on a similar scenario, Cox (2024, p. 19) makes the point that Student B’s approach is ‘an effective deployment of the resources available to her that likely prefigures the way she will access and use information throughout much of her life’. In other words, the practice of delegating tasks to other resources is rational and arguably encouraged in a culture of fast progress and productivity. Terry (2023), a US student writing about ChatGPT, states ‘we’re not being forced to think anymore’, implicating universities in creating the conditions where intellectual struggle doesn’t seem necessary.

In the current educational context, the drive to build an ‘AI Literacy’ which prepares students for a future job market seems to be taking precedence. found that employability is university students’ biggest concern, which is understandable in higher education systems where many students will take on significant debt, such as in UK. This is exacerbated by the speed of technological progress and constant media narratives of . The irony is that it is critical thinking, along with creativity, which will be the most valuable currency graduates can offer in this AI-enabled future.

‘Before teaching students how to think critically, we first need to persuade them why critical thinking is worth their time.’

Critical thinking is defined as both a skill, which can be trained and developed, and as a disposition, which refers to the inclination to apply the skill in a given situation (Facione et al., 1995). Much teaching focuses on the skill dimension, but perhaps we need to shift our attention to the disposition. To think critically takes effort, so students need to be disposed to make this effort. How can we create the conditions where students see the value in choosing to put more cognitive effort into their writing in a world where being efficient and saving time is more highly valued? In other words, before teaching students how to think critically, we first need to persuade them why critical thinking is worth their time.

References

Corbin, T., Dawson, P., & Liu, D. (2025). Talk is cheap: Why structural assessment changes are needed for a time of GenAI. Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education, 50(7), 1087–1097.

Cox, G. M. (2024). Artificial intelligence and the aims of education: Makers, managers, or inforgs?. Studies in Philosophy and Education, 43, 15–30.

Facione, P. A., Sánchez, C. A., Facione, N. C., & Gainen, J. (1995). The disposition toward critical thinking. The Journal of General Education, 44(1), 1–25. Ìý

Terry, O. (2023, May 23). I’m a student. You have no idea how much we’re using ChatGPT. The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Waltzer, T., Pilegard, C., & Heyman, G. D. (2024). Can you spot the bot? Identifying AI-generated writing in college essays. International Journal for Educational Integrity, 20(11). Ìý