Abstract

Despite their importance, the use of automated feedback and teacher feedback has been debated globally and in Vietnam. Moreover, few studies examined Vietnamese students’ perception of the automated feedback compared with teacher feedback through a cultural lens. Therefore, the present study aims to investigate how Vietnamese non-English-majored students perceive teacher feedback and automated  feedback which is based on generative artificial intelligence in learning English writing skills through the six cultural dimensions suggested by Hofstede. This qualitative exploratory study, which was undertaken at a selected university language center in Ho Chi Minh City, collected reflection papers from 22 non-English-majored students at A2 level of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages and held interviews with 10 of them to discover their perceptions of the teacher feedback and automated feedback. The data were subjected to thematic analysis and compared using Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, given the assumptions that the teacher feedback and automated feedback in Vietnam may be affected by such cultural dimensions. Six major findings include greater trust in the teacher feedback than the automated feedback; students’ need for feedback confirmation from external sources and greater individualization of the teacher feedback compared to the automated feedback; greater support for achieving high writing score by the teacher feedback in comparison to the automated feedback; more clarity from the teacher feedback than the automated feedback; students’ need for combining the automated feedback and teacher feedback for long-term English writing improvement; and students’ concern about over-dependence on the automated feedback but less dependence on the teacher feedback. These findings provide insights into six cultural dimensions underlying Vietnamese non-English-majored students’ perceptions of feedback practices, which suggests that automated feedback can be combined with teacher feedback to support students’ English writing skills.