ICAIMT — Factors Affecting the Adoption of AI Agents for Sustainable Education

In today’s dynamic academic environment, higher education institutions (HEI) worldwide are striving for accreditation. That helps guarantee quality, boosts credibility and ensures that schools follow strict standards imposed by accrediting authorities. Prioritising this accreditation trend is happening within the concentration on sustainable practices that coincides with the era of artificial intelligence (AI), where AI chatbots are transforming education. However, copying the same processes and strategies to reach similar goals exposes HEI to a McDonaldization trap while enduring the standardisation and rationalisation effects without paying attention to the core values of education. In fact, there is a lack of research about McDonaldization at HEIs and the role of AI chatbot adoption for sustainable education. Therefore, drawing upon the Technology Organisation Environment framework and the McDonaldization theory, this paper employs a qualitative approach to investigate how the adoption of AI chatbots contributes to sustainability in HEIs in Lebanon, Cyprus and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The findings highlight the McDonaldization trap occurring in universities, the importance of AI chatbots for sustainable education, and a new proposed model based on the three pillars of the TOE theory, influencing the adoption of AI chatbots in higher education while addressing the McDonaldization trap.