Preserving Critical Thinking in Nursing: Navigating the AI Revolution

Delecia Parker, DNP, MSN, RN

In the seconds it takes to assess a deteriorating client, a nurse's critical thinking can mean the difference between life and death. Yet today's nursing students are increasingly turning to artificial intelligence for answers—raising urgent questions about how technology shapes the very thinking skills that save lives.

Preserve critical thinking while navigating AI

The Central Role of Critical Thinking in Nursing

The dynamic nature of healthcare often requires nurses to make impactful, life-saving decisions (Zainal et al., 2025). Critical thinking is central to these decisions and serves as an essential skill for safe nursing practice, excellent client care, and sound clinical judgments that lead to positive outcomes (Praseyto, 2024; Sharma, 2025). Yet in today's world, technology—particularly generative AI—is influencing the development of higher-order thinking in ways that offer both promising benefits and significant challenges. To understand this tension, we must first examine what AI is and how students are actually using it.

The Double-Edged Sword of Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence (AI) refers to machines with human brain-like functions that utilize large language models and statistical analysis to process and respond to inquiries (Woo, 2025). Students are increasingly turning to AI platforms such as ChatGPT, Copilot, Claude, Articulate, and Google Gemini, to clarify difficult concepts, create study guides, gather information, and explore professional guidance.

To be clear, AI offers genuine value: it can provide instant clarification of complex concepts, generate personalized practice questions, and offer 24/7 learning support that adapts to individual learning needs. The concern is not AI itself, but rather how it's being used. While these tools can efficiently provide feedback and support personalized learning, overreliance on AI may weaken independent learning, reduce engagement, and stifle creativity and critical analysis (Bastani, 2024; Kleib, 2024; Praseyto, 2024; Roxin, 2025; Woo, 2025).

Consider a nursing student using AI to understand heart failure. ChatGPT can quickly explain pathophysiology and treatment protocols—but it cannot teach the student to recognize the subtle signs of declining cardiac function in a real patient, or to prioritize interventions when multiple problems emerge simultaneously. These skills require human mentorship, clinical practice, and reflective experience that no algorithm can replicate.

Given AI's widespread adoption among nursing students and healthcare professionals, we must examine not only how AI is used, but how thoughtfully it is integrated into nursing education to guide responsible and reflective practice. Some studies suggest that when integrated intentionally, AI can promote higher-order thinking by encouraging reflection, problem-solving, and conceptual understanding—though hands-on, interactive learning remains vital for fostering critical thinking in nursing (Sharma & Mishra, 2025).

Preserving Critical Thinking in Practice: Evidence-Based Strategies

So how do we preserve critical thinking in the age of AI? Critical thinking is the foundation of clinical judgment and effective decision-making in nursing practice (Praseyto, 2024; Woo, 2025; Zainal, 2025). Strategies such as unfolding case studies challenge students to seek, reason, and analyze information while simulating the uncertainty of real clinical scenarios (Englund, 2020). As each case evolves with incomplete data, students must integrate assessment findings, disease mechanisms, and evidence-based interventions while considering ethical and client-centered perspectives.

This multilayered approach encourages creativity, cross-course application of knowledge, and reflection on both immediate and long-term patient outcomes. Similarly, student-created blogs can promote reflection, dialogue, and evidence-based reasoning while helping learners develop accuracy, credibility, and a professional voice. These active learning strategies require students to grapple with ambiguity, defend their reasoning, and learn from both successes and mistakes—experiences that passive AI consumption cannot provide.

Ultimately, educators can strengthen critical thinking by designing meaningful, reflective, and interactive learning experiences—integrating AI as a supportive tool that enhances, rather than replaces, the human elements of reasoning and judgment essential to nursing practice.

The Path Forward

As nursing educators, we must thoughtfully evaluate how AI fits into our curricula—designing learning experiences that harness its potential while preserving the hands-on, reflective practices that build true clinical competence. The question before us is not whether to use AI in nursing education, but how to use it wisely.

Let's commit to integrating these tools in ways that enhance—not replace—the critical thinking skills that define excellent nursing care. Our clients deserve nurses who can think critically, act decisively, and adapt thoughtfully in the face of uncertainty. How will you ensure that AI supports, rather than diminishes, the development of these essential skills?

For additional information, please visit:

Bastani, H., Bastani, O., Sungu, A., Ge, H., Kabacki, Ӧ., Mariman, R.,(2024). Generative AI can harm learning. Retrieved from: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4895486  

Englund, H., (2020). Using unfolding case studies to develop critical thinking skills in     baccalaureate nursing students: A pilot study. Nurse  Education Today, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nedt.2020.104542 

Praseyto, Y., Dedi, B., Ngaduran, A. (2024). Critical thinking and artificial intelligence in tandem: A nursing perspective. Journal of Healthcare Administration, 3(1), pp. 72-81. DOI: https://doi.org/10.33546/joha.3552 

Roxin, I., (2025). Generative AI: The risk of cognitive atrophy [Interview]. Polytechnique Insights, July 2025.

Sharma, R., Mishra, P. (2025). Effects of AI use on critical thinking level of students and non-users: A comparative study of nursing students of selected nursing colleges of Jaipur, Rajasthan. International Journal of Nursing and Health Sciences, 7(1), pp. 44-45. DOI: https://www.doi.org/10.33545/26649187.2025.v.7.ila.86

Woo, B., Song, J., Middleton, E., Fijacko, N., Cato, K. (2025). Teaching critical thinking in the age of AI: Safeguarding clinical reasoning in healthcare documentation. International Nursing Review, 2025. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/inr.70102

Zainal, N., Islam, M., Rasudin, N., Zakira, M., Hanis, T., Hasani, W., Musa, K. (2025). Critical thinking and clinical decision making among registered nurses in clinical practice: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Nursing Reports, 2025, 15(175), pp. 2-19. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/nursrep15050175

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November 15, 2025