Students treated the genAI avatar as a sophisticated question base rather than a virtual patient, using predominantly closed-ended, efficiency-focused questioning¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · design r2 · q2
Currency · newest study 2026 · checked against its sources 2026-10-20 (automated, 1 of 1 entry) · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? Most student questions were closed-ended seeking short answers, and students focused on gathering history efficiently rather than approximating interaction with a real human. → Allison Mool · Jacob Schmid · Thomas Johnston · Kodi J. Smith McCoy · Zachary Patterson · Hannah Feldt · William Thomas · Emma Fenner · Kevin Lu · Raya Gandhi · Adam Western · Brendan Seabold · Daniel Vollmer · Roshan Nallaveettil · Anthony Fanelli · Logan Schmillen · Shelley Tischkau · Anna T. Cianciolo · Pinckney Benedict · Richard Selinfreund 2026

Evidence¶

Allison Mool · Jacob Schmid · Thomas Johnston · Kodi J. Smith McCoy · Zachary Patterson · Hannah Feldt · William Thomas · Emma Fenner · Kevin Lu · Raya Gandhi · Adam Western · Brendan Seabold · Daniel Vollmer · Roshan Nallaveettil · Anthony Fanelli · Logan Schmillen · Shelley Tischkau · Anna T. Cianciolo · Pinckney Benedict · Richard Selinfreund 2026¶

Allison Mool · Jacob Schmid · Thomas Johnston · Kodi J. Smith McCoy · Zachary Patterson · Hannah Feldt · William Thomas · Emma Fenner · Kevin Lu · Raya Gandhi · Adam Western · Brendan Seabold · Daniel Vollmer · Roshan Nallaveettil · Anthony Fanelli · Logan Schmillen · Shelley Tischkau · Anna T. Cianciolo · Pinckney Benedict · Richard Selinfreund. (2026). Using Generative AI to Simulate Patient History-Taking in a Problem-Based Learning Tutorial: A Mixed-Methods Study. Technology, Knowledge and Learning. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10758-025-09929-4

q2 · i? · design · r2

Descriptive observation of both genAI groups' audio recordings found most questions were closed-ended, often in jargon or formal medical tone; a Group 1 student asked the tutor "Can we give him advice or is it [the AI] just, like, a question base?" Group 1 was more open and experimental than Group 2.

"In general, students seemed more focused on how to gather history information efficiently than on approximating interaction with a real human."

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Controlled GenAI virtual-patient and communication studies reported short-term skill gains, but positive findings were not universal — related
• GenAI students collaboratively phrased and troubleshooted questions, with collaborative problem-solving varying substantially between the two genAI groups — related
• The genAI-enabled patient presented pertinent positive findings consistently with the ePBLM but deviated on non-essential content — related
• GenAI's immediate answers reduce engineering students' teacher-student interactions for generalizable tasks, while teachers remain preferred for complex problem-solving — a broader claim this one bears on
• GenAI tutorials took longer than ePBLM tutorials, with approximately 10 additional minutes spent on history-taking — related
• Patient history recall was near ceiling in both conditions, with significant decline over two weeks but no difference between genAI and ePBLM conditions — related
• Student chatbot queries were overwhelmingly task-oriented initial inquiries, dominated by definition requests and pasted assignment questions rather than iterative critique — related