Research

At AIDE, we conduct interdisciplinary research that explores how artificial intelligence, emerging technologies, and digital innovation are shaping the future of education.

Our research spans teaching, learning, assessment, educational leadership, policy, wellbeing, inclusion, and technological innovation across the educational continuum. By bringing together expertise from education, computer science, psychology, data science, policy, and related disciplines, we seek to generate evidence that informs practice, policy, and the responsible development of educational technologies.

Our research is organised across six interconnected themes:

AI Literacy and AI Pedagogy

Exploring how learners, educators, and educational leaders develop the competencies needed to engage critically, ethically, and effectively with artificial intelligence.

Digital Wellbeing and Inclusion

Investigating how digital technologies can support equitable, accessible, and inclusive learning while promoting well-being for learners and educators.

Immersive and Simulation-Based Learning

Examining the potential of virtual reality, augmented reality, simulations, and immersive environments to enhance teaching, learning, and professional practice.

Policy, Ethics and Governance

Researching the ethical, regulatory, and governance challenges associated with AI and digital transformation in education.

Digital Learning Design and Open Education

Advancing knowledge on online, blended, open, and lifelong learning through evidence-informed approaches to learning design and educational innovation.

AI and Data Science for Education

Bringing together expertise in education, artificial intelligence, learning analytics, and data science to support evidence-informed educational innovation.

Publications

Explore selected publications from centre members:

Al Omoush, M.H., Mehigan, T., Murphy, E., Ward, M. (2025). Exploring the Potential of Educational Robots in Enhancing Mathematics Education for Students with Dyslexia: Towards Inclusive Multimodal Interfaces. In: Mavrou, K., Encarnação, P. (eds) Technology for Inclusion and Participation for All: Recent Achievements and Future Directions. AAATE 2025. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-032-01632-4_41

Butler, D., Leahy, M., Charania, A., Gedara, P. M., Keane, T., Laferrière, T., Nakamura, K., Ueda, H., & Bocconi, S. (2024). Aligning Digital Educational Policies with the New Realities of Schooling. Technology, Knowledge and Learning, 29(4), 1831–1849. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10758-024-09776-9

Costello, E. (2024). ChatGPT and the Educational AI Chatter: Full of Bullshit or Trying to Tell Us Something? Postdigital Science and Education, 6(2), 425–430. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-023-00398-5

Hamash, M., Ghreir, H., & Tiernan, P. (2024). Breaking through Barriers: A Systematic Review of Extended Reality in Education for the Visually Impaired. Education Sciences, 14(4), 365. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci14040365

Hamash, M., Tiernan, P., & Young, G. (2025). Virtual reality in post-primary education research trends from 2013 to 2024: A systematic-narrative review. Computers & Education: X Reality, 7, 100123. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cexr.2025.100123

Hsu, H.-P. (2025). From Programming to Prompting: Developing Computational Thinking through Large Language Model-Based Generative Artificial Intelligence. TechTrends, 69(3), 485–506. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-025-01052-6

Hsu, H.-P., Wenting, Z., & Hughes, J. E. (2019). Developing Elementary Students’ Digital Literacy Through Augmented Reality Creation: Insights From a Longitudinal Analysis of Questionnaires, Interviews, and Projects. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 57(6), 1400–1435. https://doi.org/10.1177/0735633118794515

Jiang, S., Lee, H., & Rooney, B. (2025). Designing Usable Information Display in Immersive Virtual Environments: A Comparative Analysis of Diegetic and Non-Diegetic Designs to Identify Design Factors. Proceedings of the 2025 20th ACM SIGGRAPH International Conference on Virtual-Reality Continuum and Its Applications in Industry, 1–7. https://doi.org/10.1145/3779232.3779263

Lopez, M. F. (2022). 'Exploring forward-thinking technology perspectives of sustainable development for the year 2030 in the identity of engineering students'. Global Journal of Engineering Education, 24 (1).

Molloy, K., & Crotty, Y. (2024). How an e-Learning Course Was Created to Support Primary Teachers’ Facilitation of Student Reflective Practice through Educational Vlogging. International Journal for Transformative Research, 11(1), 20240001. https://doi.org/10.2478/ijtr-2024-0001

Moynihan, D., Broderick, N., & Usher, J. (2026). Exploring primary children’s STEM attitudes and career aspirations following a 14-week iSTEM intervention. International Journal of Educational Research Open, 10, 100568. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedro.2025.100568

Taggart, S., Roulston, S., Brown, M., Donlon, E., Cowan, P., Farrell, R., & Campbell, A. (2023). Virtual and augmented reality and pre-service teachers: Makers from muggles? Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 1–16. https://doi.org/10.14742/ajet.8610

Tiernan, P., & Donlon, E. (2024). Digital storytelling and Enterprise Education: A creative tool for presenting entrepreneurial ideas. The Irish Journal of Management, 43(1), 27–38. https://doi.org/10.2478/ijm-2024-0004

Tiernan, P., Costello, E., Donlon, E., Parysz, M., & Scriney, M. (2023). Information and Media Literacy in the Age of AI: Options for the Future. Education Sciences, 13(9), 906. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci13090906

Ward, M., Xu, L., & Uí Dhonnchadha, E. (2025). A Pragmatic Approach to Using Artificial Intelligence and Virtual Reality in Digital Game-Based Language Learning (B. Davis, T. Fransen, E. U. Dhonnchadha, & A. Walsh, Trans.). Proceedings of the 5th Celtic Language Technology Workshop, 27–34. https://aclanthology.org/2025.cltw-1.3/

Xu, L., Jia, S., Gurrin, C., Ward, M., & Tran, A. (2025). Through Someone Else’s Eyes: Lifelogging Meets Narrative Virtual Reality. Proceedings of the 33rd ACM International Conference on Multimedia, 8988–8996. https://doi.org/10.1145/3746027.3755833

Young, C., McNamara, G., Brown, M., & O’Hara, J. (2018). Adopting and adapting: School leaders in the age of data-informed decision making. Educational Assessment, Evaluation and Accountability, 30(2), 133–158. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11092-018-9278-4