EFL Teachers’ Perceptions of Ethical AI Use in Teaching, Learning, and Assessment: Insights from an Omani University Context

Abstract

This study investigates English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers’ perceptions of ethical artificial intelligence (AI) use in teaching, learning, and assessment within an Omani higher education context. Despite rapid AI adoption in education, institutional governance frameworks remain critically underdeveloped, particularly in EFL contexts — creating an urgent need for empirical, locally grounded research. Using a convergent mixed-methods design, quantitative data were collected from 52 EFL faculty members through a structured 52-item Likert-scale questionnaire, complemented by focus group discussions with nine purposively selected teachers drawn from the same participant pool. Analysis across five constructs revealed high levels of AI literacy and ethical awareness (M = 4.09), ethical responsibility and academic integrity (M = 4.19), and positive pedagogical engagement (M = 4.11). The most critical finding was a significant institutional policy deficit reflected in the lowest construct mean (M = 3.25), with the majority of participants reporting an absence of clear guidelines, consequences, or detection tools. Future orientation and framework acceptance recorded the highest mean (M = 4.30), with 98.1% of participants endorsing formal adoption of an Ethical AI Responsibility (E.A.R.) framework. Qualitative findings corroborated a persistent awareness–practice gap, student over-reliance on AI, and inadequate institutional scaffolding. The study recommends urgent development of context-specific, human-centered AI governance frameworks that bridge individual ethical awareness and institutional policy action, with particular relevance to Omani and comparable EFL higher education contexts.