60-Second SoTL

AI-Supported Feedback Uptake

Episode Summary

How might educators use AI to support students’ interpretation and uptake of feedback? This week's episode focuses on a recent mixed-methods study about student perceptions of AI's potential to support learners' reflection on and engagement with feedback they receive in higher education.

Episode Notes

View our full episode notes at https://www.centerforengagedlearning.org/ai-supported-feedback-uptake/.

How might educators use AI to support students’ interpretation and uptake of feedback?

In this episode, Jessie shares a recent mixed-methods study about student perceptions of AI's potential to support learners' reflection on and engagement with feedback they receive in higher education:

Abbas, Noorhan. 2026. “Investigating Student Perceptions of an AI-Powered Chatbot to Support Feedback Interpretation and Uptake in Higher Education.” Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2026.2706016

This episode was hosted, edited, and produced by Jessie L. Moore, Director of the Center for Engaged Learning and Professor of Professional Writing & Rhetoric.

60-Second SoTL is produced by the Center for Engaged Learning at Elon University.

Music: “Cryptic” by AudioCoffee.

Image in show art by redgreystock on Magnific

Episode Transcription

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0:10

Jessie L. Moore:

How might educators use AI to support students’ interpretation and uptake of feedback? That’s the focus of this week’s 60-second SoTL from Elon University’s Center for Engaged Learning. I’m Jessie Moore. 

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0:30

In “Investigating Student Perceptions of an AI-Powered Chatbot to Support Feedback Interpretation and Uptake in Higher Education,” Noorhan Abbas explores how AI might be used—not to give feedback—but rather to help students process and apply that feedback. Their open-access article appears in Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education.

0:53

In April 2026, Abbas conducted four semi-structured focus groups and a survey with students enrolled in an online, postgraduate masters of science in computing program at a research-intensive university in the United Kingdom. Abbas did not test an existing tool; instead, they focused on students’ perceptions of the trustworthiness and accuracy of a potential AI tool for supporting their understanding of and ability to act on feedback, as well as students’ concerns about AI-supported feedback engagement.

1:26

Abbas reports five themes from thematic analysis of the focus groups:

  1. First, students reported barriers to feedback engagement, with many students reading feedback once but not acting on it—often due to timing barriers of receiving feedback after they could act on it.
  2. Second, students were open to an AI tool that could function as a dialogic mediator, helping them make sense of feedback they received. They noted that an AI tool could remove the social cost of asking questions and could offer cognitive scaffolding rather than content generation. However, some students also expressed concern about whether such AI use to support their learning would put them at odds with university AI policies.
  3. Third, students indicated their trust of an AI tool would be contingent on specificity to their learning context and individual work. Decontextualized responses would undermine trust and inhibit students’ interest in interacting with an AI tool.
  4. Fourth, students want a human in the mix; although AI might act as an interpreter of human feedback, students still want humans assessing their work.
  5. Finally, students raised questions about privacy and data security, expressing more trust in a university-operated system than a commercial AI tool.

2:46

Survey findings generally reinforced these themes from the focus groups, and collectively, Abbas’s research suggests that an AI tool that offered a low-stakes, dialogic space for reflecting and acting on feedback could support feedback engagement, particularly if it were contextually grounded with human oversight and explicitly embraced as an allowed learning support within university policy.

To learn more about this study, including Abbas’s survey findings, visit our show notes for a link to the open access article.

3:16

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3:25

Jessie L. Moore:

Join us for our next episode of 60-second SoTL from Elon University’s Center for Engaged Learning for another snapshot of recent scholarship of teaching and learning. Learn more about the Center at www.CenterForEngagedLearning.org.

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