Influence of GenAI on Higher Education ESL Students’ Writing Confidence

The rise of Generative Artificial Intelligence (genAI) has raised debates about: What is the future of writing? These debates become more solicitous in higher education contexts. Writing becomes frustrating for English as a Second Language (ESL) students, and the release of ChatGPT has sparked tension in ESL classrooms. To examine this gap, this paper conducted a semi-structured interview study with university students to examine the influence of ChatGPT on their writing confidence. Following the synthetic data, this paper discovered that students perceived ChatGPT as a supportive learning tool, that improves grammar, eases writer's block, and provides personalized feedback. This paper presents a positive perspective regarding ChatGPT's outputs to reduce writing anxiety and boost language proficiency. These findings indicate that ChatGPT acts as a catalyst for those who encounter language barriers while taking ethical considerations into account.