This study aims to examine how performing arts professionals in South Korea perceive and intend to adopt artificial intelligence (AI) technologies amid their rapid diffusion across the performing arts sector. As of March 2025, in line with the Ministr...
This study aims to examine how performing arts professionals in South Korea perceive and intend to adopt artificial intelligence (AI) technologies amid their rapid diffusion across the performing arts sector. As of March 2025, in line with the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism’s Culture Korea 2035 initiative, which emphasizing an“AI Transformation (AX),”the number of AI-driven creative and production projects has been steadily increasing across performing arts genres-including theatre, musical theatre, music, dance, and traditional arts-in both domestic and international contexts. While AI technologies offer various positive opportunities, concerns regarding job displacement and the erosion of artistic identity coexist.
Previous studies have primarily focused on technological case analyses of artistic works, audience-centered experiential perspectives, or the psychological mechanisms of practitioners within specific genres. Consequently, there remains a lack of empirical research that structurally verifies both the positive and negative perceptions of AI technologies and their adoption mechanisms among performing arts professionals within the broader context of the performing arts field.
To address this gap, this study proposes an integrated positive–negative research model to analyze the factors influencing professionals’ intentions to adopt AI technologies. Specifically, performance expectancy and social influence from the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) were adopted as positive factors, while perceived AI threat and coping cost from the Technology Threat Avoidance Theory (TTAT) were incorporated as negative factors. A measurement model was constructed and empirically tested using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). Survey items were developed based on validated measures from prior studies and assessed using a five-point Likert scale. The participants consisted of professionals actively working in the South Korean performing arts sector. Data were collected via an online survey administered through Google Forms, yielding 307 valid responses. The collected data were analyzed using SEM and Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA), along with an additional analysis of practitioners’ qualitative opinions.
The results indicate that performing arts professionals’ intention to adopt AI technologies is significantly and positively influenced by performance expectancy and social influence. In particular, social influence emerged as a more decisive factor than individual utility perception, suggesting that colleagues, organizations, and industry-wide norms play a critical role in shaping AI adoption. In contrast, perceived AI threat and coping cost showed partial negative tendencies toward AI adoption intention but were not statistically significant, indicating that, at the current stage, anxiety and perceived costs do not substantially hinder actual adoption intentions. MANOVA results further revealed significant group differences by genre and income level. Additionally, practitioners’ responses highlighted the need for policy measures such as AI competency training, copyright and ethical guidelines, and the establishment of social safety nets.
Despite these contributions, this study has limitations. The survey sample was drawn from a limited domestic network, restricting the generalizability of the findings to the entire performing arts sector. Moreover, while the attempt to integrate positive and negative factors within a single model is meaningful, the model does not fully capture the nuanced psychological mechanisms underlying technology adoption. Future research should expand the sampling scope and incorporate a wider range of psychological variables to more comprehensively examine AI adoption intentions and actual behavioral changes among performing arts professionals.