An exploratory study of BA students’ thesis writing processes: Bloom’s taxonomy in an AI-context

Szerzők és előadók

Boksay-Pap Emese

Szekció és helyszín

AI, Writing, Knowledge and Academic Practice
2026. november 25., szerda · 13:00–14:15
Díszterem, Szentkirályi utca 28.

Teljes, beküldött absztrakt

Bloom’s Taxonomy has functioned as a vital guide for identifying learning outcomes of several generations of students for 70 years. The Taxonomy’s relevancy has become even more obvious in the present context, when AI establishes itself as a assistive tool at all levels of education. The present paper reports on a longitudinal study aimed at exploring the use of AI in the process of writing up the BA thesis of 56 university students. The study focused on identifying (a) which cognitive activities the writers held onto and performed themselves, (b) which activities they offloaded to AI, (c) and the reasoning backing up the offloading decisions. The theoretical background of the study rests on Bloom’s original Taxonomy and its revised versions, the Anderson-Krathwohl Revised Taxonomy and the AIEd Model of Bloom’s Taxonomy. Data collection took place through questionnaires, observations, and interviews. Data analysis employed the grounded theory approach and descriptive statistics. The main findings of the study, based on a preliminary analysis of the collected data, suggest that the participants held onto cognitive activities involving creativity and belonging to the higher areas of the Taxonomy: APPLYING-ANALYZING-SYNTHESIZING-EVALUATING, while they offloaded cognitive activities pertaining to the lower regions, typically to the REMEMBERING-UNDERSTANDING areas. Cognitive offload was reported as having been influenced by too steep learning curves, confusion, and writer’s block – obstacles that can be overcome with the instructors’ support and timely feedback. The employment of AI instead of search engines was also a pervasive strategy relied upon by the writers. These findings suggest that students address learning challenges willingly, when learning tasks are devised within their zone of proximal development. The findings emphasize the potential of learning environments in which learners are confident of the attainability of the tasks, gradual development of skills is a key aim, and instructors’ support is steady.

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