ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Educ.
Sec. Digital Education
Mitigating Student Resistance: The Role of Chatbots in Sustainable Educational Technology Integration
Provisionally accepted
- King Faisal University, Al-Ahsa, Saudi Arabia
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The rapid adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) in education is a key driver for achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG 4). However, its potential is frequently undermined by a critical, often overlooked barrier: student resistance to technological change, which can hinder learning outcomes and the sustainable integration of digital tools. This study explores the potential of chatbots in mitigating this resistance among high school students. The research involved 52 first-year students from a school in Al-Ahsa, selected based on their high levels of technology resistance. Participants were divided into an experimental group (n=26), who interacted with a chatbot, and a control group (n=26), exposed to traditional teaching methods. Using a randomized controlled pre-test/post-test design, the study measured resistance through a validated 17-item scale assessing four dimensions: routine adherence, emotional reactions, cognitive rigidity, and short-term thinking. Conducted over two weeks during the 2024/2025 academic year, the data were analyzed using independent t-tests. The results revealed a statistically significant reduction in overall resistance for the experimental group (t(50) = 11.21, p < .001, d = 2.87). These findings offer clear practical implications: for schools, chatbots represent a scalable strategy to ease digital transformation; for teachers, they are a tool to reduce student anxiety and ease instructional transitions; and for students, they provide a low-stakes environment to build technological confidence. This study provides one of the first empirical evidence that chatbots can be a targeted intervention for reducing student resistance, thereby offering a practical mechanism for supporting the sustainable and frictionless integration of new technologies in line with national visions like Saudi Vision 2030.
Keywords: Chatbots, Resistance to technology, sustainable education, sustainable developmentgoal, student behavior
Received: 23 Sep 2025; Accepted: 06 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Al Mulhim. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Ensaf Nasser Al Mulhim, ealmulhim@kfu.edu.sa
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