Rural-to-urban Chinese migrant workers’ perception of risk of unemployment and depression: Impact of artificial intelligence

In China, people who migrate from rural areas to cities for employment are mainly engaged in physical, repetitive, and low-skilled jobs. Artificial intelligence (AI) increases their unemployment risk, which can harm their mental health. We constructed a moderated mediation model of the link between perceived risk of unemployment and depression, and conducted a survey with 255 rural-to-urban migrant workers. Results revealed that perceived risk of unemployment had a positive association with depression, and AI anxiety mediated this relationship. Further, mindfulness moderated the association of AI anxiety and depression, and the mediating role of AI anxiety between perceived risk of unemployment and depression was negatively moderated by mindfulness. This paper extends research on the antecedents of depression under the impact of AI, providing a theoretical basis for organizational intervention in migrant workers’ mental health problems caused by the transformation of AI.