HomeBlogRelationships Tell the Robot How You Feel About Learning by Amanda SturgillSeptember 2, 2025 Share: Section NavigationSkip section navigationIn this sectionBlog Home AI and Engaged Learning Assessment of Learning Capstone Experiences CEL News CEL Retrospectives CEL Reviews Collaborative Projects and Assignments Community-Based Learning Data Literacy Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity ePortfolio Feedback First-Year Experiences Global Learning Health Sciences High Impact Practices Immersive Learning Internships Learning Communities Mentoring Relationships Online Education Place-Based Learning Professional and Continuing Education Publishing SoTL Reflection and Metacognition Relationships Residential Learning Communities Service-Learning Signature Work Student Leadership Student-Faculty Partnership Studying EL Supporting Neurodivergent and Physically Disabled Students Undergraduate Research Work-Integrated Learning Writing Transfer in and beyond the University Style Guide for Posts to the Center for Engaged Learning Blog In many ways, AI assistance can be helpful with writing, but one that has never made sense to me is asking AI to help formulate an opinion. I occasionally see this from students when I ask them what they think about something they’ve read or we’ve discussed, and I get an answer with hallucinated sources that I suspect were created with AI. Figure 1. Illustration created Dall-E with: Please create a black and white drawing similar to a Sunday Newspaper Cartoon. The illustration should depict a simple, handmade wooden booth. The booth should have a sign on the top that reads “Let’s be friends” and have a table, also wooden, behind which sits a friendly 50’s Sci-Fi style robot. Now, there are a lot of public news stories about teenagers using AI tools to deal with feelings. A recent study found that up to half of teenagers use AI tools for companionship, explaining that, among other things, AI affirms their beliefs and feelings, and it never tires of talking with them. AI is a support for real relationships, too. Faculty who have received well-worded but uncanny emails from their students may have already experienced young people turning to artificial tools to navigate social interaction. AI and HIPs This might change some of the benefits of High Impact Practices (HIPs) for college and university learners. HIPs are intended to leverage the power of interaction with peers and faculty to help students engage with substantive content (Kuh 2008). This can include substantial time and authentic interactions that help a learner appreciate how others approach problem-solving. These interactions can build an important set of capacities. For example, when students have authentic interactions in the context of community-based learning, they can sometimes engage across differences, building a sense of belonging. These interactions may also contribute to developing intercultural competence (Soria 2017). Students can also gain facility in understanding new perspectives and getting along with diverse personalities through collaborative group work, whether in classes, in the internship or co-op workplace, or in the lab as an undergraduate on a research team. Scholars have also found positive effects on leadership development (Soria 2017). Again, here, the magic is, at least in part, because of the quality of interactions that HIPs tend to require. Looking Forward So, the question becomes, what happens when those interactions are supported or replaced by technology? It’s not too difficult to imagine: a student studying abroad doesn’t have to navigate language and different customs or worry about time differences with people at home because the AI companion can be their friend. A student doing an internship is under less pressure to learn to deal with a challenging boss because AI writes their emails for them. The student who dislikes group work no longer is compelled to deal with the other students due to project size or scope – AI can take on that work, and no human helpers are needed. The project gets done, but some of the lessons don’t get learned. There are smaller effects as well, as students may choose the easier AI companionship over peers in residence halls, cafeterias, and classes. Again, part of the curriculum can be missing, and academia loses some ability to acculturate its learners into critically thinking adults. References Kuh, George D. 2008. “Why Integration and Engagement are Essential to Effective Educational Practice in the Twenty-first Century.” Peer Review 10 (4): 27-28. Soria, Krista M., and Matthew Johnson. 2017. “High-Impact Educational Practices and the Development of College Students’ Pluralistic Outcomes.” College Student Affairs Journal 35 (2): 100–116. Southern Association for College Student Affairs. https://doi.org/10.1353/csj.2017.0016. About the Author Amanda Sturgill, associate professor of journalism, is the 2024-2026 CEL Scholar. Her work focuses on the intersection of artificial intelligence (AI) and engaged learning in higher education. Dr. Sturgill also previously contributed posts on global learning as a seminar leader for the 2015-2017 research seminar on Integrating Global Learning with the University Experience. How to Cite This Post Sturgill, Amanda. 2025. “Tell the Robot How You Feel about Learning.” Center for Engaged Learning (Blog). September 2, 2025. https://www.centerforengagedlearning.org/tell-the-robot-how-you-feel-about-learning/.
