The Impact of GenAI‐Based Collaborative Inquiry on Critical Thinking in Argumentation: A Case Study of Blended Argumentative Writing Pedagogy

Critical thinking is an essential skill in the age of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI). GenAI affords dialectic argumentation, which provides opportunities for the development of critical thinking in argumentation (CTA). However, there was limited empirical evidence of how learners specifically utilize GenAI to construct argumentation. This longitudinal case study aimed to explore seven EFL university freshmen's collaborative use of GenAI for argumentation in a blended learning pedagogy over a semester, and how it could affect their CTA, by analyzing GenAI conversation screenshots, classroom recordings, argumentative writing products, and semi-structured interviews. The results revealed that students strategically coordinated human and GenAI at different stages of GenAI-based collaborative inquiry for argumentative writing, and their CTA was enhanced in both collaborative discourse and writings. Along with this, students perceived the facilitating roles of GenAI-based collaborative inquiries in developing CTA and identified collaboration as the key to its successful implementation. The findings of this study provide implications for effective integration of GenAI into argumentative writing instruction.