Abstract—This study investigates the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools in an undergraduate business course to understand how students incorporate these technologies into their academic work. The research draws on data collected in the Fall 2024 semester where AI tools were neither encouraged nor discouraged but rather introduced by students themselves as their personal learning tool. This environment provided a natural setting to observe student behavior. Findings reveal that students primarily used AI tools, especially ChatGPT, for improving writing quality, generating ideas, and proofreading content, which is particularly valuable for non-native English speakers. Some students also reported using AI for quantitative tasks such as data analysis and coding, though to a lesser extent. The study further explores student motivations, which include enhancing efficiency, improving academic performance, and verifying answers. However, challenges emerged around the reliability of AI-generated content and ethical concerns related to plagiarism. The paper concludes by discussing implications for academic integrity, pedagogy, and the role of AI in shaping future learning environments in business education, while exploring possible differences in usage between undergraduate and graduate students.
 

Keywords—Artificial Intelligence (AI), ChatGPT, motivation, academic integrity, learning tools

Cite: Danielle Morin and Amirhossein Hosseinipour, "Autonomous Adoption of AI Tools by Undergraduate Business Students: An Exploratory Study," International Journal of Learning and Teaching, Vol. 12, No. 1, pp. 49-53, 2026.

Copyright © 2026 by the authors. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited (CC BY 4.0).