Artificial Intelligence as a Digital Linguistic Scaffold in Higher Education: Evaluating ChatGPT-Assisted Revision for Enhancing Second-Language Academic Writing

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-618-5_20How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Artificial Intelligence in Education; ChatGPT; Second Language Writing; Digital Learning Ecosystems; Linguistic Scaffolding; Corpus-Assisted Analysis; Higher Education

Abstract

Within the evolving digital learning ecosystems, artificial intelligence technologies are increasingly being embedded into pedagogical practices to enhance teaching–learning experiences and improve measurable academic outcomes. Large language models such as ChatGPT have created new possibilities for real-time feedback, iterative revision, and individualized linguistic support in second-language writing instructions.

Contextualised by established theories of Second Language Acquisition (SLA), particularly the sociocultural theory of Lev Vygotsky, Stephen Krashen’s Input Hypothesis, and Merrill Swain’s Output Hypothesis, the present study investigates how AI-assisted feedback can function as a digital linguistic scaffold in second-language academic writing. Employing a mixed-methods research design, the study was conducted with sixty-four second-year engineering students enrolled in an English for Professional Purposes course. Participants first produced initial writing drafts independently and subsequently revised their texts using AI-mediated feedback generated by ChatGPT.

To evaluate the impact of AI-assisted revision, pre- and post-intervention drafts were analysed using the corpus-analysis platform Voyant Tools to examine vocabulary density, lexical distribution, and readability indices. Statistical comparison of the datasets reveals a statistically significant improvement in vocabulary density, lexical diversity, and readability scores in the revised drafts, indicating enhanced syntactic clarity, lexical diversity, and overall textual coherence. Qualitative reflections from participants further suggest that AI-generated feedback encouraged iterative revision, strengthened metacognitive awareness, and fostered greater learner autonomy during the writing process.

The findings demonstrate that AI-driven writing tools can function as effective pedagogical scaffolds within digitally mediated learning environments and support Outcome-Based Education through data-driven evaluation of learning outcomes in second-language writing instruction.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial 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.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Jaya Sharma
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/10/06
TI  - Artificial Intelligence as a Digital Linguistic Scaffold in Higher Education: Evaluating ChatGPT-Assisted Revision for Enhancing Second-Language Academic Writing
BT  - Proceedings of the 18th National IQAC Conference (ICon 2026)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 242
EP  - 273
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-618-5_20
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-618-5_20
ID  - Sharma2026
ER  -