Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2024

DOI

10.1007/s11528-024-01025-1

Publication Title

TechTrends

Volume

29

Issue

13

Pages

17433-17465

Abstract

While there has been ample discussion regarding Artificial Intelligence (AI)’s contributions and challenges on the development agenda at the policy level, little is known about how students translate the potential and barriers of AI in achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Drawing upon various qualitative data, including class observation, focus group interviews, and learning activity outcomes generated by 240 students across 7 different majors, this case study explores the expected roles of AI as well as barriers to AI adoption for sustainable development perceived by undergraduate students. The study revealed that students anticipated AI to play diverse roles, including data analyst, a bridge to connect people and resources, and a barrier breaker. On the other hand, students addressed multiple barriers to AI adoption for sustainable development including access to high-quality data and lack of a goal-oriented AI model and skills in AI development and use. These findings suggest how AI can be conceptualized and positioned as a development intervention as well as offer implications on AI-driven interventions for SDGs.

Rights

© 2024 The Authors.

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

Original Publication Citation

Kim, J. (2024). Artificial Intelligence in achieving sustainable development: Expectations of undergraduate students. TechTrends, 29(13),17433-17465. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-024-01025-1

ORCID

0000-0002-3365-7354 (Kim)

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