Using Genai in Marketing Education: Unpacking the Elevation-Exhaustion Continuum

The rapid adoption of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) has made its use ubiquitous and often unguided. Many GenAI advancements quickly gained traction in marketing education, with promising results for learners. The demonstrated efficiency and effectiveness of GenAI could accelerate marketing education toward collective elevation. However, the potential consequences, intended or unintended, are also being experienced in real time. The opposing outcomes of elevation and exhaustion form a continuum in which collective efficiencies can accelerate human effort toward even greater productivity, potentially fostering demotivation. There is a gap in research on the lived experience of the elevation-exhaustion outcomes continuum and on how marketing educators and learners can harness the benefits of GenAI while avoiding its pitfalls. This paper contributes to the marketing education literature by proposing a model to enhance future outcomes in the use of GenAI. The model also addresses counterproductive outcomes that exhaust marketing educators and learners. The paper concludes with guidance on the use of GenAI and future considerations to promote elevation and avoid exhaustion.