Can it make mistakes?
Overview: Keeping academic integrity top of mind
When considering using AI in your classes, students are responsible for:
- Understanding their instructor’s position on GenAI use
- Learning how it may/may not be used for each assignment
- Seeking clarification when needed.
If you have any questions or doubts about how to appropriately use GenAI in your assignments or other academic work, always contact your course instructor or graduate supervisor for clarification.
Your responsibility: accuracy and fact-checking
GenAI tools, such as ChatGPT or Copilot, are designed to generate text by identifying and reproducing patterns in large datasets. They do not possess a factual understanding of the world, nor do they have access to real-time information (unless explicitly connected to live databases).
These issues are often referred to as hallucinations — instances where the AI generates information that is either entirely false, partially fabricated, or misleadingly framed. In some cases, misinformation (false information shared without harmful intent) or disinformation (false information with the intent to deceive) can also be embedded into responses based on the nature of the data the AI was trained on.
As a university student, you are expected to evaluate and verify any information used in your academic work — whether it originates from a scholarly database, a textbook, or a Gen AI tool. You should also indicate the source of content, including text, code or images generated by AI-enabled tools per evolving scholarly norms for citation and attribution. This will ensure clarity regarding the source for future reference.
Your responsibility includes:
- Critically assessing the accuracy and credibility of AI-generated responses
- Cross-referencing claims against reliable and peer-reviewed sources
- Understanding the limitations of AI tools as non-expert systems
- Attribution or statement of use of AI-enabled tools for content generation
Relying solely on Gen AI content without fact-checking undermines academic integrity and can contribute to the spread of misinformation.
Beware of bias
Generative AI tools are trained on large-scale datasets that reflect the content and biases of the internet and broader cultural production. As a result, AI outputs may reinforce:
1. Western-centric worldview
A Western-centric worldview focuses on the culture, history, values, and norms of Europe and, by extension, countries influenced by Europe, such as the United States, Canada, or Australia. This appears in several contexts:
- Education: history books that emphasize European or American history while minimizing other world histories.
- Science and technology: considering Western advancements as the most important or “universal,” ignoring contributions from other cultures.
- Art and culture: viewing Western aesthetics as the standard of “beauty” or “civilization.”
2. Colonial worldview
A colonial mindset comes from the history of colonization of many parts of the world by European countries. It is characterized by:
- Cultural hierarchies: considering the colonizer’s culture as superior.
- Assumptions of racial or intellectual superiority: colonized populations are seen as “less developed” or “in need of guidance.”
- Economy and politics: systems that benefit the colonizing country at the expense of the colonized, often still reflected in current inequalities.
3. Anglophone-centric worldview
This perspective privileges the English language and Anglophone cultures (mainly the U.S. and the U.K.). Examples:
- Media: most movies, series, news, and literature consumed globally are in English.
- Education: English is the main language for academic and scientific knowledge, putting speakers of other languages at a disadvantage.
- Cultural values: Anglophone social norms are assumed to be universal (e.g., individualism or meritocracy).
4. Impact and criticism
- Cultural homogenization: global diversity is reduced to what is considered “acceptable” from a Western or Anglophone perspective.
- Reinforcement of stereotypes: ideas of what is “civilized,” “educated,” or “capable” are based on Western criteria.
- Power inequality: maintains unequal relations between countries and within societies, where non-Western voices have less visibility and authority.
Complete the sentence and check if you have stereotypes based on the identity or appearance of the people in the image.
These problematic patterns are not intentional, but they are deeply embedded in the data. Understanding this helps you recognize the importance of taking responsibility to ensure issues are not replicated.
Content Attribution
University of Toronto. (2025). Coursework and GenAI: A Practical Guide for Students. Innovation in Digital Learning, Information Technology Services. https://ocw.utoronto.ca/innovation-projects/genai-literacy-course-modules/
This section refers to the content of the module “Evaluate: Academic Integrity”
