Effects of Gen-AI integrated science reading activity on primary school students' intrinsic reading motivation.

INTRODUCTION: Generative Artificial Intelligence (Gen-AI) can generate new content such as text, images, audio, and video based on users' needs. This study designed a Gen-AI integrated science reading activity to examine its effects on primary school students' intrinsic reading motivation. METHODS: A mixed research design was adopted with sixth-grade students from a public primary school in central China. Two classes were randomly assigned to an experimental group (Gen-AI integrated reading) and a control group (traditional reading). RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: Independent-samples t-tests showed no significant differences between the two groups in intrinsic reading motivation before the experiment. After the intervention, the experimental group showed greater improvement than the control group. ANCOVA results indicated that the Gen-AI integrated science reading approach had significant positive effects on intrinsic reading motivation. Semi-structured interviews further revealed that the approach can satisfy students' autonomy, competence, and relatedness from multiple aspects. In addition, the limitations and future prospects of this study were also discussed.