Robot risk awareness, zero-sum beliefs, and hotel frontline employee’s self-objectification: the moderating roles of psychological safety and gender

As service robots become increasingly integrated into the hospitality industry, concerns are growing about their psychological impact on frontline employees. Grounded in Social Comparison Theory and Cognitive Appraisal Theory, this study explores how robot risk awareness influences hotel frontline employees’ self-objectification, identifying zero-sum beliefs as a mediating mechanism and examining the moderating roles of psychological safety and gender. Drawing on survey data from 298 employees, the results show that robot risk awareness positively predicts self-objectification through the activation of zero-sum beliefs.

The direct effect of robot risk awareness on self-objectification is amplified in low psychological safety environments. Gender further shapes the process: male employees are more likely to form zero-sum beliefs in response to robot threats, whereas female employees are more prone to internalizing these beliefs via self-objectification. These findings suggest that self-objectification serves as a psychological defense when employees perceive technological displacement.

This research deepens theoretical understanding of employees’ cognitive-emotional coping responses to automation and offers practical guidance for cultivating psychologically safe and gender-sensitive workplaces. This research was supported by Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province (No. 2025J011125). International business school, Fuzhou University of International Studies and Trade, Fuzhou, China The authors declare no competing interests.

This study was conducted in accordance with the ethical principles outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki (1964) and its later amendments, as well as relevant institutional ethical guidelines. The study involved anonymous, voluntary self-reported survey data collected from adult hotel frontline employees. The research protocol was reviewed by the Ethics Review Committee of the International Business School, Fuzhou University of International Studies and Trade (FUIST), and was granted an exemption from formal ethical approval because the study involved minimal-risk, non-invasive survey procedures and did not collect personally identifiable or sensitive information.

Informed consent was obtained from all participants before they completed the survey. Participants were informed about the purpose of the study, their voluntary participation rights, and the confidentiality of their responses. Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

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