Artificial intelligence may replace many jobs or transform them. It is widely said that artificial intelligence will replace many of our j...
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| Artificial intelligence may replace many jobs or transform them. |
Beyond the big question of how we will earn money if machines can do things exponentially faster and cheaper than humans can, there are major psychological issues to consider. Separating ourselves from the world of work will not be an easy thing to do, given the social norms associated with having a job and being productive. We may complain about bad bosses, annoying colleagues, and having to wake up to an alarm clock, but work provides structure, gives us a sense of purpose, and makes us feel valued.
A steady stream of research over the years has shown the powerful psychological benefits of work. Dr. Erman Palmore, a professor of medical sociology at Duke University, for example, has found that work not only helps keep people “alert” but also demonstrates our skills and abilities, contributing to self-worth and self-esteem. A job also offers the opportunity to learn new things, feel appreciated, and to mix with others, the latter facilitating our humanistic trait as social beings. Work is, after all, a prime way to meet and engage with people, something linked to emotional well-being.
In his essay in the 2002 book The Psychology of Work, Charles L. Hulin of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign nicely captured the central role that work plays in modern society: "In the United States and other nations in the industrialized world, our work defines us. You are what you do. To do nothing is to be nothing. Just as doing nothing negates our humanity, we are defined privately and socially by our
That work heavily informs our personal identities is reflected by our habit of asking people we meet for the first time, “So, what do you do?” We typically reply with a job description and often a place of employment rather than a list of things we like to do in our spare time. Hulin pointed out that many Anglo-Saxon names—such as Baker, Carpenter, Cooper, Cook, Miller, and even Smith—originate in a person’s occupation, a literal indication of our deeply seated attachment to work.
Need it be said, paid work provides income and security, which in turn fosters the perception that one is autonomous and independent—this too is of significant psychological value. For better or worse, “money is a nearly universal metric used to measure accomplishments,” Hulin wrote, with the ability to acquire things and experiences the primary means to operate in a society grounded in consumer capitalism. It’s fair to say that working makes not working more enjoyable, as for many, a life completely defined by leisure would get old very fast.
Research has also shown there to be a correlation between work and mental health in older age. A study of British men with Alzheimer’s published in 2009 in the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry revealed that symptoms developed later among those who had worked longer (seven weeks for every additional year worked). Scientists attributed the effect to what they called cognitive reserve—the brain’s resilience, or ability to cope with damage. Mentally challenging activities, such as an engaging job (as well as volunteering or taking classes), built up cognitive reserve, they theorized, lessening memory problems.
In short, work greatly signifies an individual’s value to society, something that can be traced back to our Puritanical roots, in which vocation was directly linked to divinity. Work is a principal source of personal satisfaction, established routine, and social relationships, and, if nothing else, something to do for a third or more of our waking life. Concerns that AI may pose a threat to this important part of life in the not-too-distant future are thus justified, although those with a sense of history know that advancing technologies have long been predicted to make human work obsolete.
