Abstract
The integration of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in creatives has caused significant psychological concerns for professionals like replacement fears, obsolescence of skills, and loss of identity, which have been cumulatively termed as Creative Displacement Anxiety (CDA). Although the revolutionary promise of GenAI has garnered greater attention, empirical research is devoid of measurement tools for the unique psychosocial stressors creatives face in AI-augmented environments. This research aims to fill the identified gap by constructing and validating a multidimensional scale for CDA utilizing a two-phase methodology. Based on information gathered from creative industry professionals, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) revealed seven fundamental dimensions of CDA. Furthermore, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) indicated an adequate model fit (CFI = 0.948, RMSEA = 0.039); however, issues regarding discriminant validity arose, highlighting similarities between constructs like skills atrophy and job anxiety. Despite these challenges, the scale demonstrated good reliability (CR = 0.723-0.859) and provides the first empirical measure of anxiety resulting from displacement by GenAI. The results contribute to academic knowledge of the psychosocial effects of artificial intelligence and give organizations practical recommendations for facilitating workforce adaptation. By addressing the measurement gap in AI-anxiety studies, the research assists in developing strategies to reduce technological disruption while safeguarding the essential function of human imagination. Future research should continue to establish the scale's discriminant validity and examine its cross-cultural usage to facilitate equitable resilience in changing creative economies.
Keywords
Generative AI; Creative Displacement Anxiety; Scale Development; Human-AI Collaboration
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/iasdr.2025.46
Citation
Chung, K.Y., Ma, H.,and Chan, Y.K.(2025) Measuring Creative Displacement Anxiety in the Age of Generative AI: Scale Development and Validation, in Chang, C.-Y., and Hsu, Y. (eds.), IASDR 2025: Design Next, 02-05 December, Taiwan. https://doi.org/10.21606/iasdr.2025.46
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Conference Track
Track 3 - Design, Art & Technology
Measuring Creative Displacement Anxiety in the Age of Generative AI: Scale Development and Validation
The integration of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in creatives has caused significant psychological concerns for professionals like replacement fears, obsolescence of skills, and loss of identity, which have been cumulatively termed as Creative Displacement Anxiety (CDA). Although the revolutionary promise of GenAI has garnered greater attention, empirical research is devoid of measurement tools for the unique psychosocial stressors creatives face in AI-augmented environments. This research aims to fill the identified gap by constructing and validating a multidimensional scale for CDA utilizing a two-phase methodology. Based on information gathered from creative industry professionals, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) revealed seven fundamental dimensions of CDA. Furthermore, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) indicated an adequate model fit (CFI = 0.948, RMSEA = 0.039); however, issues regarding discriminant validity arose, highlighting similarities between constructs like skills atrophy and job anxiety. Despite these challenges, the scale demonstrated good reliability (CR = 0.723-0.859) and provides the first empirical measure of anxiety resulting from displacement by GenAI. The results contribute to academic knowledge of the psychosocial effects of artificial intelligence and give organizations practical recommendations for facilitating workforce adaptation. By addressing the measurement gap in AI-anxiety studies, the research assists in developing strategies to reduce technological disruption while safeguarding the essential function of human imagination. Future research should continue to establish the scale's discriminant validity and examine its cross-cultural usage to facilitate equitable resilience in changing creative economies.