Exploring EFL Libyan Students' Use of AI ChatGPT in English Language Learning

الملخص

ChatGPT has attracted the attention of scholars, educators, teachers and students since its emergence in 2022. Many researcher papers have been written about the potential of employing this digital platform in the teaching and learning process. What makes this platform distinct is its ability to provide its users with a wide variety of textual corpus in different disciplines, yield various linguistic models that are similar to those produced by human beings' when interacting in real conversations. Therefore, due to its significant role in education and particularly in English language learning /teaching, this study aims to explore how EFL Libyan students use ChatGPT in English learning. The participants in this study are 71 Libyan university students whose major is English. They are undergraduate and postgraduate. They study at the Faculty of Arts, Faculty of Education, Faculty of Languages and Translation and the Libyan Academy in Misurata. Data for this study was collected by means of Google electronic forms. They included both closed and open-ended items. The collected data was analyzed automatically and results were displayed in charts with percentages. The findings of this study revealed that Libyan university students do use ChatGPT in their learning of English language. Furthermore, use of ChatGPT among these students began in 2022 which is the year in which this platform was released. Another finding is that ChatGPT can be a powerful and useful tool for learning English so as to it can assist them to perform many tasks which are related to their academic domain.