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The adoption of AI tools in the workplace is making employees more productive, but new research from freelance hiring firm Upwork suggests it might also be hurting their mental health.
Following a survey of 2,500 workers (including executives, full-time employees, and freelancers) across multiple countries, the research showed that the most devoted users of AI tools, including agents, are also 88% more likely to experience burnout and twice as likely to quit, compared to their colleagues who use the technology less frequently.
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The vast majority of freelancers (88%) who responded to the survey, in contrast, said their use of AI has positively impacted their careers, without the psychological downsides reported by their full-time, salaried counterparts.
Among all respondents, 90% said they've come to view AI more as a fellow coworker than merely a tool. Interpersonal workplace dynamics are shifting as a result, according to the report: for example, 85% of respondents said they're more polite to AI than to their fellow human workers, while 67% report feeling a higher level of trust towards AI than towards their human coworkers.
"These findings illustrate that workers achieving the greatest productivity with AI have lost a sense of psychological safety and team connection that is foundational to their work experience, fueling their burnout and intentions to leave their current employment," Upwork noted in its report.
The new findings follow research from Harvard Business Review published in May, which found that the use of generative AI in the workplace can boost productivity while simultaneously reducing one's sense of meaning at work. The report also comes at a time when business leaders are figuring out what role AI will play in their companies, and how it will affect the future of their workforces.
Promises vs. reality
Big tech firms like Microsoft, Google, Salesforce, and Amazon have been investing heavily in AI agents -- automated systems that can formulate strategies, take action, and use a suite of digital tools on behalf of human users -- while marketing them to businesses as tools for boosting workplace productivity and efficiency.
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