Trust and Reliance on AI in Education: AI Literacy and Need for Cognition as Moderators

The study investigates the relationship between student trust in AI and their reliance on AI-generated suggestions during programming tasks, using a sample of 432 undergraduates. Findings reveal a non-linear relationship where increased trust correlates with decreased appropriate reliance on AI, moderated by AI literacy and need for cognition. This highlights the necessity for educational frameworks that foster critical evaluation of AI outputs, which is essential for practitioners developing AI tools in educational contexts.