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Main Authors: Capozucca, Alfredo, Yampolskyi, Daniil, Goldberg, Alexander, Cristiá, Maximiliano
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
Subjects:
Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.07789
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author Capozucca, Alfredo
Yampolskyi, Daniil
Goldberg, Alexander
Cristiá, Maximiliano
author_facet Capozucca, Alfredo
Yampolskyi, Daniil
Goldberg, Alexander
Cristiá, Maximiliano
contents This paper investigates the role of AI assistants, specifically OpenAI's ChatGPT, in teaching formal methods (FM) to undergraduate students, using the B-method as a formal specification technique. While existing studies demonstrate the effectiveness of AI in coding tasks, no study reports on its impact on formal specifications. We examine whether ChatGPT provides an advantage when writing B-specifications and analyse student trust in its outputs. Our findings indicate that the AI does not help students to enhance the correctness of their specifications, with low trust correlating to better outcomes. Additionally, we identify a behavioural pattern with which to interact with ChatGPT which may influence the correctness of B-specifications.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2502_07789
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Do AI assistants help students write formal specifications? A study with ChatGPT and the B-Method
Capozucca, Alfredo
Yampolskyi, Daniil
Goldberg, Alexander
Cristiá, Maximiliano
Computers and Society
Artificial Intelligence
This paper investigates the role of AI assistants, specifically OpenAI's ChatGPT, in teaching formal methods (FM) to undergraduate students, using the B-method as a formal specification technique. While existing studies demonstrate the effectiveness of AI in coding tasks, no study reports on its impact on formal specifications. We examine whether ChatGPT provides an advantage when writing B-specifications and analyse student trust in its outputs. Our findings indicate that the AI does not help students to enhance the correctness of their specifications, with low trust correlating to better outcomes. Additionally, we identify a behavioural pattern with which to interact with ChatGPT which may influence the correctness of B-specifications.
title Do AI assistants help students write formal specifications? A study with ChatGPT and the B-Method
topic Computers and Society
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.07789