Personality and Adaptive Coping in the Digital Age: Psychological Pathways to Emerging Technology Adoption, with a Focus on Artificial Intelligence

Background Rapidly developing technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), and blockchain, continue to reshape social structures, professional domains, and daily life. Objective This study investigates how individual personality characteristics shape people’s willingness to adopt and engage with such innovations. Methods A cross-sectional survey was conducted with 202 Romanian adults (aged 18–61), who completed validated measures assessing personality traits (Big Five agency, beliefs, conscientiousness, dynamism, and morality), cognitive–emotional coping strategies (cognitive emotion regulation questionnaire), and the use of AI, IoT, and blockchain technologies (hours per day). Data were analyzed using Jamovi, applying descriptive statistics, correlations, multiple regression with Bonferroni corrections, and mediation/moderation analyses with bootstrap resampling. Results The analyses indicated no evidence of common method bias. Among the three tested models, only AI use was significantly predicted by personality factors, with extraversion exerting a positive effect and maturity a negative effect. Age moderated the extraversion–AI relationship, suggesting stronger effects among younger participants. Mediation analyses showed that adaptive coping strategies did not play a significant mediating role. Conclusion Personality factors, particularly extraversion and maturity, play a central role in the adoption of AI, while coping strategies showed limited explanatory power. The moderating effect of age suggests that younger individuals may benefit more from extraversion in engaging with digital technologies. These findings underscore the importance of considering psychological factors in understanding digital transformation and call for further research into how individual differences shape technology use.