Master Students’ Perceptions of How ChatGPT Influenced Critical Thinking in Academic Writing at The Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City

ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence (AI) tool adapted to various fields, including tertiary education. Typically, some postgraduate students might recognize this state-of-the-art technology as a useful aid to improve critical thinking skills in their academic courses, while some recognize the limited creativity and critical thinking skills. Therefore, this study aims to discover the perceptions on whether ChatGPT use can enable Master students to promote or restrict critical thinking abilities in academic writing output at IUH, Vietnam. The researchers will integrate quantitative and qualitative methods to gather opinions from 28 postgraduate students using ChatGPT in their writing work, simultaneously applying semi-structured interviews to get in-depth sharing on how ChatGPT affects the development of their critical thinking and potential drawbacks in academic tasks when utilizing this tool. The study highlights the positive effect of utilizing ChatGPT on students' critical thinking in the context of academic writing. However, it also emphasizes that overreliance on this tool may lead to analysis limitations and plagiarism issues. As a result, educators must consider applying a balanced pedagogical approach to this tool to foster students' writing work and their critical thinking skills.