Slides from a presentation I gave to Grad students in the Masters and PhD program in education and technology and e-learning at U. Aberta - Portugese Open University in December 2025. The talk is titled AI in Research and research Publications.

1. "Encontro com o Professor
Terry Anderson –
Projecting the Futures of
Research in Open, Distance
and Digital Education”
Terry Anderson, PhD
Professor Emeritus Athabasca University
November 2025

2. First Thanks to all at
Universidade Aberta
and especially LE@D
• You have given me a chance to work
with innovative, smart and caring colleagues
• An opportunity (and excellent excuse) to visit Portugal on more
than one occasion
• Intellectual stimulation and chance to experience the research
process in Europe
• Some great dinners, Fada and conversations
• My greatest academic award
• And most important, some great friendships

3. Outline
• Open Universities and Research
• A bit about myself and my Career
• The Community of Inquiry
• AI in Research and Publication
• Copyright in AI
• Your Comments and Questions

4. Open University Family
- Two Outsized Siblings
• 1. Smaller non-resident
Open universities in
countries with
advanced economy
• Examples
• Universidade Aberta
• Athabasca
• UO Catalonia
• OU Netherlands
2. Mega Universities
It is all about Access,
Opportunity,& Lifelong-Learning

5. Our Shared Open Values
• Continuing education opportunity is a basic human right.
• We can (and must) continuously improve the quality,
effectiveness, appeal, cost and time efficiency of the
learning experience.
• Student control, choice and freedom is integral to 21st
century life-long education and learning.

6. • Challenge of Open Universities
• Massive High-Quality Teaching vs. High Research Output Quality
Most large Open mega -universities do very little Discipline Research
200,000 online students
3.5 million students

7. • It is one of the fastest-growing universities nationwide,
largest university in the USA with 170,000 online students
and 3,000 on campus
• “SMU is recognized for the ways it supports students, faculty
and alumni as they become ethical, enterprising leaders in
their professions and communities.”
• “undergraduate research opportunities, specific research
centers like The Center for Higher Education Policy and
Practice (CHEPP), and academic departments that support
student research through various guides and initiatives.”
Does High Quality Teaching and Learning require compromise in Discipline Research?

8. Critical Role of Research Units in all
Open Universities
• Changing Technologies demand continuous research
• Evaluation
• Strategic Initiatives
• Blue sky initiatives and “skunk works”
• Promotion and publication

9. Key aspects of LE@D:
Mission: To lead research and innovation in
open and distance education in the digital
society.
Research Areas: Its research is structured
around three strategic areas: Theories and
Practices in Open and Distance Education;
Education and Sustainability; and
Educational Issues in the Post-digital Era.
Activities: Offers services and
consultancy, training, organizes events
(like "LE@D Talks"), and publishes (RE@D -
Revista de Educação a Distância e
eLearning journal)

10. Likely much more than you
ever wanted to know about
Terry Anderson

11. “Canada is a great country
too cold for common sense,
inhabited by compassionate,
intelligent people - with bad
haircuts”. Yann Martel
Image: FrePik

12.  Born and Raised in
Calgary, Ab. Canada
 BA in Psych, Univ of
Alberta, 1971
 “Back to the land farmer
and woodworker” 1971-
86
 MSc. Educational
Technology, University
of Oregon, 1987
 PhD Educ. Psych.
University of Calgary,
1991

13. First Director - Contact North
Thunder Bay
www.contactnorth.ca/

14. University of Alberta
1994-2001
 Director of Academic Technologies for
Learning
 Faculty development and media
production Centre
Image Enclariya Radio

15. Athabasca University,
Alberta, Canada
* Athabasca University
34,000 students, 700 courses
100% distance education
Graduate and
Undergraduate programs
Master & Doctorate
Distance Education
Only USA Regionally
Accredited University
in Canada
*Athabasca
University
L'Odyssée de Pi
L'Odyssée de Pi

16. Landing.athabascau.ca
• Elgg Open Source Software 16

17. We all have a “cold start problem”
• A technology is not
useful until it is used.
• A technology is not
used until it is useful

18. My greatest Academic Success
• Most cited work by both
researchers and practitioners in
ODL
• Of 68,000 references to my work
39% are related to the COI papers
(Google Scholar, Nov. 2025)
• I quit doing work on the COI over
20 years

19. 4th
- Learning Presence - COI from a
Teaching to a Learning Model
Learning presence in the revised community of inquiry framework: A systematic review
of empirical research (2010–2024)CC Chang, WH Yen, SC Liu, CT Kuo - The Internet and Higher
????

20. The COI
Model
Doesn’t
Scale
Designed by and for distributed,
small – medium classes
Is very challenging to use with self-
paced learning
Challenging to measure except by
perception studies
Anderson’s (2003) not so famous
“Interaction Equivalency Model
Can AI not replace but can enhance
each of the three presences?

21. Does AI change everything in
Research?
Photo Chris Andrassy

22. Research Paradigms
Positivism - Quantitative ~ discovery of
the laws that govern behavior - reliability,
validity
Constructivist - Qualitative ~
understanding from an insider perspective
Critical - Postmodern ~ Investigate and
expose the power relationships
Pragmatic ~ interventions, interactions and
their effect in multiple contexts

23. AI in Quantitative Research:
Makes much easier and faster:
Hypothesis generation
Literature review and synthesis
Data Collection and analysis
Language Translation and grammatical
improvement
Citating and documenting
Automating replication

24. AI In – Qualitative Research:
Critical Research:
Design drafts / translate interview guides
Automate survey or focus group interactions
Analyse Video Footage
Transcribe, Summarise and extract themes
from interview transcripts
Draft writes and reports
https://www.insightplatforms.com/5-ways-to-use-ai-for-qualitative-research/
Is AI Qualitative Research realy Qualitative Research?

25. AI In - Critical Theory In Research
- “challenge and change unjust social
structures, power dynamics, and oppressive
systems by deconstructing knowledge”
Goal is change – NOT objective
truth, nor reflecting prevailing attitudes.
targeted messages to re-educate
audiences – propaganda
identification and suppression of
oppositional ideas, institutions and
organizations

26. GEN AI Benefits for
Research Authors
• Aids authors who struggle with
writing (second languages,
writer’s block, brainstorming)
• Frees up time to focus on
substance - not presentation
• Widens access to non
anglophones
• Reformats content, (bullets to
prose, audio, video, songs,
different styles etc.)
Image: PeerReview

27. AI Generated Content for
BOTH OER and Research
Image: Openclipart
• Accessible
• Easier
• Faster
• Built to suit culture and context
• More effective

28. AI Content is Public Domain
US: Content Generated Solely by
AI is Ineligible for Copyright — AI:
The Washington Report
by: Bruce D. Sokler, Alexander Hecht, Christian Tamotsu Fjeld of Mintz - Mintz Insights
Wednesday, August 23, 2023
only human-
authored parts of
a work can be
copyrighted
Beijing Internet Court If producer
is involved in the generation process be the author.
He/she could be the author
Creativity,
intellectual input ,
interactivity
OWNER: the USER or the PRODUCER?
Europe: Consensus is to deny
copyright for AI content

29. The O’Driscoll Postulation
The Principal takes responsibility for All content
Author(s
)
Principal

30. AI in Research Publication
Image https://www.cabidigitallibrary.org/doi/book/10.1079/9781800626607.0000

31. Benefits for
Journal Editors
and Reviewers
• Pre-screening for quality
• Automating routine and
administrative tasks
• Handling desk jobs
• Streamlining processes
• Scheduling
• Record-keeping
• Reduce staff workload
Image: PublishingState

32. Challenges for
Journal Editors &
Reviewers
• Bias in AI: review fairness &
editorial decisions
• Efficiency vs. Quality: need
quality peer review. Is
average AI review superior
to human authored AI?
• Training and Adaptation for
editors &reviewers
• Verification
• Transparency

33. Should Authors reference use of AI?
• APA Guidelines:
• Describe usage: Explain how you used the AI
tool in your introduction or methodology
section.
• Provide prompts and output: Include the
specific prompts you used and any relevant
generated text within your paper or in an
appendix.
• Cite (author/owner, date) all uses ie Example
for ChatGPT: OpenAI. (2023). ChatGPT (Mar 14
version) [Large language model].
https://chat.openai.com/chat.
• In-text citation
• Parenthetical: Use the format (Author,
Year).Example: (OpenAI, 2023).
• Narrative: Integrate the author and year into the
sentence. Example: OpenAI (2023) argued that.
Proposed IRRODL Citation Example
“After using Generative AI (POE, Perplexity, ChatGPT4, e
I reviewed and edited the content,
including references as necessary
and take full responsibility for it.

34. Authors’ oppose AI “scraping”
• Unsubstantial copying is NOT
copyrighted
• Substantial copying is allowed – for some
applications - Fair Dealing/Use
• Ideas are NOT copyrightable
• People amass most knowledge without
permission
• Internet users take knowledge without
compensation
• Authors are almost never aware of how
their work is used
Image:Medievalists.net

35. AI ‘Scrapes” my blog post on
virtualcanuck.ca
• “Q: “What is useful about
Anderson’s Interaction
equivalency theory?”
• Anderson, T. (2003). Getting the
mix right again: An updated and
theoretical rationale for interaction
– IRRODL 4(2).
• 1100 Citations on Google Scholar
• Found 10 things other authors
have found it useful for.
• About 7 more uses than I could
think of.

36. • Permitted educational uses
• Non-commercial educational use: The law allows for the use of
copyrighted works without permission for non-commercial
educational purposes.
• Proportionality and acknowledgment: Such uses must be
proportionate to the educational goal and require that the author's
name and the source of the work are properly acknowledged.
• Other exceptions: The law also includes other exceptions for private
and non-commercial use, criticism or review, scientific purposes, and
temporary reproductions essential to technological processes.
“Portugal does not have a general "fair
use" doctrine, but its copyright law
provides specific exceptions for certain
uses, including those for educational
purposes.”

37. AI Criticism:
Empathy &
Connection?
• Absence of Empathy: No
emotional intelligence &
compassion
• Erosion of Human Connection?
• Could replace interpersonal
engagement?
• Corporate Values
Image: PublicDomainPictures

38. How to Maintain the Human
Connection in Education?
• Premium on human
communication/interaction
• Extensive use of both asynchronous
and synchronous communications
• Create assignements in which
communication is integrated
Photo: Mark Perna
https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/influence-
change-at-work/episodes/Episode-25--The-ROI-of-
Change-Management-e38ek8

39. If Empathy and
Connection are so
important, why don’t
our institutions
implement them?
Some teaches are
empathetic.
Others are not so
Imsge: Flickr

40. What AI can’t do well
Empathy
Loyalty
Contextualization to local context
Value based judgment and decision
making
But does AI love you?

41. AI Criticism:
Cultural
Issues?
• Western-Centric
• Linguistic Limitations
• Cultural Homogenization
Image: Fredvanamstel

42. Accessibility Issues
• knowledge is no longer confined to
traditional classroom settings,
those in rich countries - it is
accessible everywhere to anyone.
• But Digital Divide still exists
Image:TheRightSoftware

43. AI in all Research
• Faster and more through grant applications
• Citation format and maintenance
• Creation of diagrams, charts, tables etc.
• Format changes
• Help meets publishing standards

44. Overall, AI
Effects on
Researche
rs
Higher quality research demanded
• Larger sample size,
• better data analysis,
• more competition
Predatory Journals will improve
rapidly
Non-profit journals will need
funding to invest in AI training and
technologies

45. Technology Changes;
Our open Universities
Values Don’t Change
• We can (and must) continuously improve the
quality, effectiveness, appeal, cost and time
efficiency of the learning experience.
• Student control, choice and freedom is
integral to 21st
century life-long education and
learning.
• Continuing education opportunity is a basic
human right.

46. • Your Questions and
Comments are most
welcomed!
Terrydanderson2@gmail.com