The Educational Use of Technological Tools: A Case Study on the Formation of Stereotypes and Prejudices on the Subject of Migration

This paper presents a case study on the use of chatbots in relation to the topic of prejudice. The educational dimension of the activity proposed to the students aims to make them more aware of the methods and criteria through which an opinion or belief is formed and to reveal the possible prejudices that always accompany the analysis of an argument.  There is a close relationship between the technological environment, the medial dimension of technological tools, and the development and acquisition of peculiar formae mentis that affect every aspect of life. Between technological and human evolution there is a retroactive and recursive relationship that, interpreted from a perspective that sees the nature-culture continuum, allows the tetralogical relationship 'anthroposocial development-technology-culture' to be understood in a hybrid, generative and emergent sense, thus overcoming the classic opposition between technophobes and technophiles. Biocultural evolution as well as the technopoietic dimension referring to technology, according to the parameters of a systemic perspective, lead to the conclusion that it is not possible to mechanistically and deterministically foresee either developments or limits of this evolutionary hybridisation. Among the technological innovations, the increasingly frequent recourse to artificial intelligence, in the species of chatbots, and the consolidated phenomenon of information and the formation of public/collective opinion through social media and the content disseminated on the web, are interrogated starting from three specific issues, pertaining to the field of Media Literacy but not only, in accordance with the most recent acquisitions in the field of research: a) The heart of the significance of AI lies explicitly in the fact that it complements or replaces human activity in the broad sense, not as a mere enhancement or prosthesis of some function, but in what is most specific to human 'nature': thought, the capacity to learn and to choose. b) The risk of conformism and deresponsibilising delegation of one's conscience, also due to the fragmentary and sometimes uncontrolled dimension of information and the consequences of widespread authoritarianism, which requires a critical, reflective and dialogic rationality. c) The possibility of discriminatory behaviour on the part of data learning systems, caused by the introduction of biases reflecting the natural human propensity to prejudice.