زهراالسادات حسینی دستجا

Abstract

With the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence applications in education, there is an increasing need for structural and conceptual analysis of existing research in this domain. Despite the quantitative growth of related publications, significant gaps remain in understanding thematic trends, emerging concepts, and theoretical and practical challenges in smart education. This study aims to conduct a thematic analysis and temporal trend examination of scientific documents related to AI applications in education, focusing on identifying dominant and emerging themes and conceptual shifts in the field.

In the theoretical section, a systematic literature review was conducted to identify conceptual frameworks related to adaptive learning, human-machine interaction, the evolving role of teachers in technology-rich environments, and ethical and legal challenges. In the empirical section, a set of international scholarly articles was analyzed using thematic analysis and topic clustering methods. The textual data were processed through clustering algorithms and temporal analysis techniques.

Findings revealed that themes such as intelligent learning and educational interaction, adoption of emerging technologies, educational technology for teachers, and learning analytics are central to recent research. Additionally, emerging themes such as educational chatbots, machine-generated content detection, and the use of large language models were identified—topics that had received limited attention in earlier literature. The trend analysis from ۲۰۲۰ onward indicated that generative AI tools have gained increasing prominence in recent years, whereas topics related to teacher-focused educational technologies have a longer historical presence.

Based on these findings, it is recommended that educational policy design, smart tool development, and teacher empowerment initiatives pay special attention to emerging themes and the practical needs of intelligent learning environments. This study provides a conceptual overview of the current landscape and offers a foundation for strategic decision-making in the field of smart education.

Keywords: Smart Education, Artificial Intelligence in Education, Generative Artificial Intelligence in Education, Educational Chatbots, Human-Machine Interaction in Learning, AIED