Whose story do we live? Experiential authorship threat in AI-mediated hospitality journeys and its consequences for meaning, memory, and engagement

AI now functions as hospitality’s concierge, curating itineraries, wellness plans, and trip narratives at scale. While such systems boost efficiency and personalisation, they raise a symbolic concern central to hospitality: when algorithms pre-write the journey, do guests still feel like the authors of their own experiences? This research introduces and validates Experiential Authorship Threat (EAT), defined as the perceived loss of agency, ownership, and self-authored meaning when AI curation displaces the guest’s narrative role. Across six studies (scenario-based, embedded-field, and interface experiments; total n = 2073), AI (vs. human) curation elevates EAT, especially under rigid itineraries (Study 1), and EAT, rather than adjacent constructs, drives symbolic and behavioural disengagement through diminished psychological ownership, particularly among guests high in narrative identity (Study 2). Framing AI as a co-creator rather than a curator, and offering editable rather than pre-filled itineraries, restores autonomy and authorship and improves engagement and satisfaction (Studies 3 and 4). The cost of EAT is greatest for symbolic, identity-relevant trips and high-identity-salience guests (Study 5) and persists in impoverished post-trip memory (Study 6). Theoretically, the research integrates self-determination, narrative identity, and meaning-maintenance perspectives to position EAT as a distinct psychological mechanism in hospitality. For managers, preserving guest authorship through framing, interface design, and symbolic sensitivity emerges as a design priority alongside accuracy and speed.