The Impact of AI Identity on University Students’ Research Creativity and the Moderating Role of Ethical Dilemmas: An Ambidextrous Learning Perspective

Artificial intelligence has been effectively integrated into every stage of undergraduate research, significantly improving students’ learning efficiency. Against this backdrop, artificial intelligence is no longer merely an optional external tool, but has become an extension of college students’ personal capabilities—that is, “AI identity.” The study constructs a moderated dual-mediation model from the perspective of ambidextrous learning. Moving beyond prior work on AI usage frequency or literacy, this study centers on AI identity and reveals the double-edged effect of AI identity on research creativity, with a positive indirect effect via exploratory learning and a negative indirect effect via exploitative learning, along with the asymmetric moderating role of ethical dilemmas on these two pathways. Using questionnaire surveys analyzing 451 college student responses, the results demonstrate that AI identity positively correlates with research creativity, where exploratory learning serves as a positive mediator while exploitative learning acts as a negative mediator. Ethical dilemmas moderate the relationship between AI identity and ambidextrous learning. These findings provide actionable insights for higher education institutions to foster students’ exploratory AI use, mitigate overreliance, and establish ethical governance frameworks for AI-assisted research, thereby assisting universities in guiding students toward developing a healthy understanding of AI identity and refining ethical guidelines for AI applications.