| Sumario: | Background: Cross‐cultural understanding is essential in education as learners increasingly engage with diverse cultural perspectives. Although artificial intelligence (AI) tools like contextual recognition and real‐time feedback offer personalised and adaptive support for these tasks, few studies have explored their role in fostering cross‐cultural understanding within authentic learning environments. Objectives: This study focused on how AI supported effective learning about traditional foods and clothing from four ethnic groups: Indonesian, Thai, Vietnamese, and Chinese to promote cross‐cultural knowledge and engagement in real‐world contexts. Methods: A five‐week quasi‐experimental study was conducted with 25 graduate students (8 females, 17 males, aged 23–35) from four ethnic backgrounds: Indonesian, Thai, Vietnamese, and Chinese. All participants had advanced English proficiency and no prior cross‐cultural learning experience. The AI X‐Cultural App integrated six AI‐supported features: authentic context recognition, sample sentence generation, scaffolding, inspirational question generation, feedback, and Q&A to support cross‐cultural writing tasks. Data were collected from pre/post essays, system interaction logs, and interviews to assess cross‐cultural understanding, learning behaviours, and user perceptions. Results and Conclusions: The study yielded three key findings. First, students showed significant improvements in cross‐cultural understanding after engaging with the X‐Cultural AI app. Second, students' use of AI‐generated questions and Image‐to‐Text Recognition (ITR) features strongly correlated with enhanced writing performance. Finally, interview responses revealed that participants perceived the app as highly supportive in fostering their cross‐cultural learning. These qualitative and quantitative results together indicate the strong potential of AI‐supported tools to help learners connect prior knowledge with new cultural information in real‐world, authentic learning contexts. Practitioner Notes: What is currently known about this topic ○Technology enhances cross‐cultural learning through various digital tools.○Traditional technologies, such as emails and blogs, have been effective in cross‐cultural educational contexts.○AI technologies are emerging as powerful tools for creating immersive and interactive learning experiences.What this paper adds ○Demonstrates the effectiveness of AI in enhancing cross‐cultural understanding within authentic learning environments.○Introduces the AI X‐Cultural App to support cross‐cultural learning.○Establishes a strong correlation between specific learning behaviours and improvements in cross‐cultural understanding.○Highlights positive student perceptions of AI‐supported cross‐cultural learning activities, reinforcing the app's potential for educational use.Implications for practice and policy ○AI tools, such as the X‐Cultural App, should be integrated into educational programs to enhance cross‐cultural understanding.○Personalised AI feedback and scaffolding can improve learner engagement and academic outcomes.○Educators can leverage AI applications to create immersive and authentic cultural learning experiences, fostering deeper intercultural competence.
|
|---|