Rethinking Academic Integrity with the rise of Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) In Legal Research

Abstract

Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been crowned a savior for legal scholars and professionals alike because of its ability to use simple prompts for instruction and generate content within seconds, owing to its efficiency in the processes of legal research. With the rampant use of AI across the research community, information has been flowing out at rates never before. However, the increase in AI tools leads to the misuse of such tools. A huge ethical question looms on whether content created by generative AIs is “original” content acceptable in research or a conduction of plagiarism, the extreme conditions leading to potential copyright violations. This paper aims to recognize generative AI models and its massive impact in legal research, attempting to uncover the extent of ethical use of generative AI in the processes of initial research and content writing, and focusing on ways for maintaining integrity based on doctrinal methodology using national and international laws as primary sources of information and books, journal articles and news articles as secondary sources of information. The paper recognizes the importance of integrating legal research with technological innovation. It aims to emphasize that, despite being a significant aid in academic research, generative AI should be viewed as a learning guide rather than an outright content creator to maintain the highest academic integrity. Therefore, the obligation in maintaining academic integrity starts with the legal researcher by limiting the use of generative AI for initial investigation on subject matters or content editing processes for language or grammatical revisions rather than reliance for complete articulation.