Date: 
November 2024
Issue: 
The Language Teacher - Issue 48.6; November 2024
Writer(s): 
Macpaul C. Hirata, Musashi University; Hakeem A. Azeez, Meiji Gakuin University

 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be a great ally for academic writers by helping them to improve their writing skills and productivity (George, 2022). The adoption of transformative technology in conservative educational settings inevitably sparks controversy and reluctance, akin to the initial resistance to computers in language learning (Warschauer, 1998) and Google Translate’s integration into second language learning (Knowles, 2022). However, the debate surrounding AI writing tools in academic contexts is changing from “if” to “how.” The answer hinges on effective and responsible use, which are also central to ethical considerations. Tseng and Warschauer (2023) proposed an AI literacy framework with four key elements: understand, prompt, corroborate, and incorporate (see Figure 1).

 

Figure 1

AI Literacy Framework From Tseng & Warschauer (2023)

  • Understand: Clear comprehension of AI-generated content involves understanding how these tools work, their limitations, and operational context. Knowing when and where to use them and navigating their interface contributes to informed decision-making. For instance, understanding prompt input and interpreting generated output is essential.
  • Prompt: Crafting effective prompts is crucial for obtaining desired AI outputs. Similar to search engines, the maxim “garbage in, garbage out” applies; clear and specific prompts ensure AI comprehends intent, yielding relevant and accurate content.
  • Corroborate: Due to potential inaccuracies or outdated information, cross-referencing AI-generated content with reliable sources is essential. This practice prevents blind reliance on AI outputs.
  • Incorporate: Ethical use of AI-generated content hinges on integration without plagiarism, appropriate citation, and maintaining academic integrity. Effectively integrating AI into the writing process requires critical evaluation of accuracy, coherence, and suitability within academic papers.

In this two-part how-to guide, we will introduce and illustrate how to improve your writing skills and productivity using AI tools. In Part One, we will briefly explain AI and their potential applications in academic writing.  This will be followed by recommendations of some popular AI tools for writing and a summary of the specific tasks they perform. Then we will explain how to use AI tools in the planning and writing stages of your research paper. In Part Two of this guide, we will continue with the use of AI in the editing and referencing stages. 

 

Part One

What is an AI Tool?

Simply put, AI tools are applications or systems that utilize AI algorithms to perform tasks traditionally done by humans. These AI tools are becoming increasingly prevalent in various sectors, including academic writing, where they have the potential to revolutionize the way we research, write, and edit academic papers, especially with the recent advances in AI text generators (AITGs) like OpenAI’s ChatGPT models and Google’s Gemini (Cano et al., 2023). 

 

Potential Applications in Academic Writing

  • Research: By finding relevant sources and summarizing complex texts, AI tools can save researchers time.
  • Mapping out key concepts from academic papers: Tools, such as Scispace can aid in this process.
  • Drafting papers: AI tools can help structure academic papers logically by suggesting outlines, providing appropriate keywords, and giving advice on directions to follow for a research paper.
  • Proofreading: Tools, such as Grammarly, use AI to enhance writing quality by identifying grammatical errors and suggesting sentence structure improvements.

 

AI Tools for Academic Writing 

Even though there are an endless number of AI tools, not all of them do what they claim to do. To help you streamline the selection process, Table 1 displays some AI tools that we have used and can recommend.  

 

Table 1

Recommended AI Tools Suitable for Key Academic Writing Tasks

Skill area / Tasks / AI tools

  • Planning
    • Brainstorming
    • Structuring & outlining
    • Finding sources
    • Topic modeling
      • Jasper AI
      • AvidNote
      • Jenni AI
      • Scispace
      • ChatGPT 4o
      • Gemini
  • Writing
    • Paraphrasing
    • Summarizing
    • Drafting
      • QuillBot
      • Jenni AI
      • ChatGPT 4o
      • WriterBuddy
  • Editing
    • Language enhancement
    • Plagiarism detection
      • Grammarly
      • WordTune
      • CopyLeaks
      • ProWritingAid
  • Referencing
    • Citing sources
      • Scite
      • PaperPal
      • EndNote
      • Jenni.AI
      • Mendeley
      • Zotero

Note: Currently valid URLs to these tools are displayed in the Appendix.

 

AI Tools for Ideas, Outlines, and Relevant Sources 

The first step in academic writing is often generating ideas. OpenAI’s GPT-4o can generate ideas based on a given prompt. By inputting a topic, the tool can provide several angles to approach it from, thus aiding in brainstorming. Similarly, Frase.io can generate content briefs and topic suggestions based on keywords, helping you to explore different perspectives. 

The next step is outlining your paper. With tools, such as ChatGPT-4o or Jenni.AI, you can create an essay outline based on a chosen topic. These tools can suggest a structure, including an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion, each with a specific focus. 

The third step involves sourcing relevant literature for reviews. Semantic Scholar and Scite are AI-powered tools that connect concepts based on queries, presenting the most pertinent academic papers and filtering out less significant ones. Google Scholar is also valuable for locating sources. Tools, such as EndNote or Zotero, utilize AI to organize references, aiding in structuring papers around key sources. Additionally, Scispace enhances comprehension by analyzing, summarizing, and providing clear explanations of articles, along with displaying related papers in one location.


 

Research Gaps, Questions and Literature Reviews  

A research paper’s relevance hinges on filling a research gap, which may stem from insufficient or nonexistent prior research, controversy, or limitations in previous studies. Identifying these gaps typically requires extensive reading of numerous papers over weeks. However, Scispace can significantly expedite this process. After creating an account, enter a specific question prompt, such as “How does listening to English songs impact L2 learners’ vocabulary acquisition?” The program returns the top 10 current papers on the topic, analyzing insights, conclusions, methods used, limitations, results, and implications. To streamline your focus, deselect unnecessary categories using the Add column-function, leaving only “limitations,” “methods used,” “research aim,” and “suggestions for future research.” Then identify common themes in methods used, study limitations, and future research suggestions, sorting them by relevance or date and exporting them to Excel. After reviewing suggested future areas of research, use ChatGPT to pose further inquiries, such as “What papers have explored this area?” Use these insights to discover additional relevant papers.   

                                                                                                                   

AI Tools to Draft Your Paper 

We all experience writer’s block; AI tools, such as Jenni AI, ChatGPT-4o, EssayBot, or Jasper AI, are helpful in generating drafts. Providing the AI tool with topics or main ideas will enable it to generate text or offer suggestions for your paper’s structure, arguments, and supporting evidence. Having achieved a working title and outline, you can begin drafting your paper. Jenni.AI offers the flexibility of starting in any of the sections in the outline. As you write, the AI will provide you with relevant prompts and suggestions from its databases based on your keywords, making the drafting process as smooth as possible. If there is a concept or term that you want to quickly look up, you can seamlessly ask the chatbot embedded in the tool to define the term or elaborate more on it. 

 

Part Two

AI Tools for Editing

Though editing is a crucial phase of writing, it can be a time-consuming and tedious process. Thankfully, this process can be streamlined with AI tools. They can elevate the quality of your writing, ensuring that it is error-free, clear, engaging, and—most of all—original.

Grammarly can help by checking grammar, spelling, and punctuation. Through an add-on for all major word processing programs and browsers, Grammarly can offer real-time corrections and suggestions to refine your writing. 

ProWritingAid is a great AI tool for polishing your paper and improving style. It analyzes your text in detail, providing reports on various aspects, such as overused words, sentence length, and consistency, offering suggestions that could improve your paper’s clarity and flow. 

Gemini, Grammarly, SpinBot, and PaperPal provide suggestions to enhance your writing style and tone when you specify a particular register, such as formal, persuasive, or informative. This could be replacing nonacademic phrases, such as “a whole lot of people” with “a considerable number of individuals…”, adjusting sentence structure, or incorporating more topic-specific vocabulary.

In addition to Grammarly, Turnitin, Copyleaks, and Copyscape can be used to ensure originality and avoid plagiarism. These tools can scan your work against vast databases to identify any unintentional plagiarism. 

ChatGPT-4o or Microsoft Copilot can analyze an entire paper, identify strengths and weaknesses, and suggest ways to improve the paper. Thus, you can get a quick second opinion on your paper. 

 

AI to Manage Your Sources 

As you write, Jenni.AI can use the keywords and search databases to provide links to relevant papers. For example, if there is a sentence that you have written, but you cannot remember its source, highlighting the sentence and typing the “@” mark will provide a link to the paper. There will be an option to either open the paper or automatically create an in-text citation and reference to the source. In this way, the tool will help to incorporate outside sources or quotes into your writing seamlessly while avoiding plagiarism. You will need to designate the preferred citation style prior to using the automatic citation feature. 

AI tools can help you to not only simplify the citation process but also to enhance the credibility and accuracy of your work. Scite, for instance, can be invaluable in assessing the quality of your sources. It has a smart citation feature which can be installed as a browser extension. It will help you see how a paper you have found has been cited by providing the context of the citation and indicating whether it has been supported or contradicted. You can use EndNote, Zotero, or Mendeley to efficiently organize references, generate citations, and create bibliographies in various styles. 

 

Conclusion

The adoption of AI writing tools in academic writing proposes significant benefits. It can streamline the entire writing process from planning to referencing, thereby empowering you, the researcher, to focus on critical thinking and analysis—the hallmarks of strong academic work. However, it requires an understanding of the strengths and limitations of the technology as well as a firm commitment to ethics and honesty. This ensures that AI serves only as a tool for enhancement rather than a replacement for the human intellectual endeavor (Chubb et al., 2021). We believe that with effective and responsible use, you can unlock the power of AI to expedite your research writing.    

 

References

Cano, Y. M., Venuti, F., & Martinez, R. H. (2023, February 1). ChatGPT and AI text generators: Should academia adapt or resist? Harvard Business Publishing Education. https://hbsp.harvard.edu/inspiring-minds/chatgpt-and-ai-text-generators-...

Chubb, J., Cowling, P., & Reed, D. (2022). Speeding up to keep up: Exploring the use of AI in the research process. AI & Society, 37(4), 1439–1457. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-021-01259-0 

George, E. (2022, October 26). AI in research and the changing scholarly publishing landscape. Researcher.Life. https://researcher.life/blog/article/ai-in-research-and-the-changing-glo...

Knowles, C. L. (2022). Using an ADAPT approach to integrate Google Translate into the second language classroom. L2 Journal, 14(1). 195–236. https://doi.org/10.5070/L214151690 

Tseng, W., & Warschauer, M. (2023). AI-writing tools in education: If you can’t beat them, join them. Journal of China Computer-Assisted Language Learning, 3(2), 258–262. https://doi.org/10.1515/jccall-2023-0008  

Warschauer, M. (1998). Electronic literacies: Language, culture, and power in online education. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781410604682 

 

Appendix

Links to AI Tools

Note: The URLs and services listed in this appendix were valid at the time of publication. However, due to the rapid pace of change and development in the field of artificial intelligence, these links and services may be subject to change.