Breaking career boundaries in the AI era: how AI literacy relates to university students’ perceived employability through future work self salience and boundaryless career mindset

Introduction As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes increasingly embedded in learning and work, understanding its relevance to students’ career development is increasingly important. Drawing on a career construction perspective and boundaryless career theory, this study examined associations among self-reported AI literacy, future work self salience, boundaryless career mindset, and perceived employability. Methods Cross-sectional questionnaire data were collected from 1,945 university students in China. Confirmatory factor analysis and full latent-variable structural equation modeling were conducted. Specific and theoretically ordered indirect associations were evaluated using bias-corrected bootstrap confidence intervals. Results Self-reported AI literacy was positively associated with perceived employability, with positive specific indirect associations through future work self salience and boundaryless career mindset. A theoretically ordered indirect association involving both constructs was also significant. However, an alternative model reversing their ordering yielded equivalent global fit, indicating that the data could not distinguish between the two specified orderings. Discussion The findings connect students’ perceived AI-related competencies and employment prospects with two distinguishable career cognitions: the salience of a desired occupational self and psychological openness to career boundaries. Their joint examination provides a differentiated account of concurrent associations in students’ career preparation. The cross-sectional findings do not establish causality, temporal precedence, or an underlying psychological sequence. Longitudinal and multi-source research is needed to examine temporal relationships and determine whether these associations extend to demonstrated AI competencies, career behavior, and actual employment outcomes.