AI-assisted history education in China: a secondary evidence map of psychological antecedents and learning outcomes

Front Psychol. 2026 Sep 23;17:1956962. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1956962. eCollection 2026.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: Evidence on the use of artificial intelligence in Chinese history education remains fragmented. This study mapped the available secondary evidence and contextualized it with targeted corroboration of history-specific studies.

METHODS: We analyzed a public bibliographic export of 1,063 records current to 1 April 2024 and conducted targeted full-text corroboration to identify history-education evidence beyond the original repository. After sequential screening, 30 records were retained for the contextual map. An expanded synonym audit was also performed to assess whether any direct history-education studies were missed.

RESULTS: Nine records explicitly identified mainland China, Hong Kong, or Taiwan as the study setting, including five primary empirical studies. The synonym audit did not identify a direct history-education study in the repository. Targeted corroboration identified one 2025 mainland-China study of AI-assisted secondary-school history teaching, two systematic reviews describing broader history-education literature, and one adjacent cultural-heritage education study. In the regional subset, emotion/anxiety/cognitive-load outcomes were reported in five records, engagement in four, motivation and self-efficacy in three each, skills/competence in six, and knowledge and performance in five each.

DISCUSSION: The repository should be interpreted as a contextual map of secondary evidence rather than a comprehensive estimate of the field. Overall, the evidence suggests emerging but still limited and heterogeneous attention to AI in Chinese history education.

PMID:42846141 | PMC:PMC13642265 | DOI:10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1956962