Patterns and Purposes: A Cross-Journal Analysis of AI Tool Usage in Academic Writing

Abstract

This study investigates the use of AI tools in academic writing through an analysis of AI usage declarations in journals. Using a mixed-methods approach combining content analysis, statistical analysis, and text mining, this study analyzed 135 AI declarations from 8633 articles across 27 categories. Results show that ChatGPT dominates academic writing assistance (73.3 percent usage). The primary purposes of AI integration are concentrated on lower-level cognitive tasks, specifically improving readability (57.8 percent) and grammar checking (19.3 percent). Statistical analysis indicates a highly significant association between team composition and AI-use purposes (p = 0.0008), highlighting international teams' reliance on grammar assistance, while no significant association was found regarding authors' native-speaker status (p = 0.2359). These findings provide insights for journal policy development and for understanding the evolving role of AI in academic writing.