79% of parents don’t trust the use of AI in schools

The latest consumer insight from digital identity security specialists, ID Crypt Global, has revealed that 79% of UK parents don’t trust the use of AI and ChatGPT when it comes to educating their children.

The survey of 1,300 UK parents found that 75% of them were not familiar with ChatGPT, the AI powered language model that has seen increasing levels of use within our day to day and professional lives.

While it was initially banned by schools as a tool for cheating on exams and essays, there is a growing sentiment that it could help improve educational standards, providing a powerful classroom aid to make lessons more interactive, teach students media literacy and save teachers time on admin, amongst other things.

When asked about their biggest concerns surrounding the incorporation of ChatGPT within the education system, the majority of parents cited a potential loss of critical thinking and problem-solving skills.

A lack of personal or human interaction with teachers and peers was also a concern, followed by issues surrounding plagiarism and cheating.

In fact, just a fifth (21%) of parents stated they were likely to trust the educational content and guidance provided by AI and ChatGPT.

Half (50%) of those surveyed also expressed concerns over the potential negative impact of ChatGPT on their child’s social and emotional development.

When asked about the most important safeguarding measures they would like to see implemented, a quarter (25%) stated they would like to see parental consent over the use of ChatGPT in schools; a further 24% want clear guidelines on when and how it should be used; 21% would like to see monitoring and mediation of ChatGPT interactions within schools.

If monitored and implemented correctly, 32% stated they thought ChatGPT could be used as a good additional learning resource, 26% think it could help revision and 17% believe it could be used to aid homework and coursework.

However, 94% think it is the schools responsibility to provide clear communication and transparency about the use of ChatGPT in the classroom, as well as how it should be used at home in relation to school work.

CEO and Founder of ID Crypt Global, Lauren Wilson-Smith, commented:

“The advancement of technology has dramatically changed the way children can be educated and, for the large part, it has brought about real benefits that allow a more immersive, efficient, higher quality of teaching.

But parents will be understandably cautious about the emergence of new technologies such as AI and ChatGPT and how they could be detrimental to their children’s education, whether it be the facilitation of lazy learning, the heightened temptation to cheat or plagiarise, or simply because we live in an age of rampant fake news and misinformation.

It’s how we proceed from this point that is vital and we must ensure that any integration of AI within an education setting is done so sensitively and without compromising a child’s ability to evolve, learn and progress in life.”