Tag Archives: health

Stop Burnout, Increase Engagement & Improve Safety…by Providing Supportive Environment?

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Topic: Health and Safety, Motivation, Human Resources
Publication: Journal of Applied Psychology (JAN 2011)
Article: Safety at Work: A Meta-analytic Investigation of the Link Between Job Demands, Job Resources, Burnout, Engagement, and Safety Outcomes
Authors: Jennifer D. Nahrgang, Frederick P. Morgeson, David A. Hofmann
Reviewed by: Mary Alice Crowe-Taylor

These days, the workplace is generally quite demanding! This study used a meta-analysis approach, with 203 independent samples, to assess how detrimental job demands are, and how helpful job resources are, in terms of burnout, engagement and safety outcomes. These researchers wanted to know how well the job demand-resources theory (JD-R) by Bakker & Demerouti (2007) explains these relationships.

According to this analysis, pretty well actually! The model that best fit the data supported the JD-R’s theoretical links between job demands-health impairment-burnout-negative safety outcomes. Burnout was harmful to safe work practices! It also supported the theory’s links between job resources-motivation-engagement-positive safety outcomes. Engaged employees are motivated to work safely.

Job demands included variables like job complexity, role overload, cognitively challenging work, physical demands, and risks and hazards. Draining to employees both physically and psychologically, these result in burnout, health impairments, and a greater number of unsafe outcomes, as this study showed. Only the variable “physical demands” was not related to burnout or engagement.

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Status Inequality Within Teams? Could Be Trouble

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Topic: Teams, Performance
Publication: Journal of Applied Psychology (SEP 2010)
Article: Beyond Status: Relating Status Inequality to Performance and Health in Teams
Authors: A.M. Christie, J. Barling
Reviewed By: Ben Sher

Okay everyone, who’s excited about the new basketball season?  I/O Psychologists are!  In fact, Christie and Barling (2010) did a recent study that analyzed NBA players to determine if “status inequality” is related to lower performance.  They found a relationship if the low status players also exhibit uncooperative behavior.

Wait a second, so how did they figure that out?  They started with the argument that sports is a natural setting for the observation of team dynamics.  They first assessed each player’s individual status (using factors such as salary, awards, and tenure) to determine how much players’ statuses varied within a given team.  When there was a lot of variation between high status players and lower status players, that team could be said to suffer from status inequality. 

Then, they evaluated uncooperative behavior by measuring number of suspensions and ejections from games for unsportsmanlike conduct.  To assess how these factors relate to performance, the authors used established formulas for calculating players’ on court effectiveness, and they also looked at absenteeism, or the number of games players missed due to injury or illness.

What they found is that when teams with high levels of status inequality also have low status players who display uncooperative behavior (ejections or suspensions), then those low status players will also have poorer performance. 

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Heavy Workloads: Much More Than Just a Nuisance

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Topic: Stress, Wellness, Work Environment
Publication: Personnel Psychology (Summer 2010)
Article: Psychological and physiological reactions to high workloads: Implications for well-being
Authors: R. Ilies, N. Dimotakis, and I.E. De Pater
Reviewed By: Benjamin Granger

In a rather unique study by Ilies, Dimotakis and De Pater (2010), the authors found that heavy workloads can have negative psychological (distress) and physiological (blood pressure) effects that fluctuate depending on an employee’s daily workload.  The authors also investigated how daily changes in workload affect employees’ daily well-being when they get home from work.

Ilies et al. employed a sample of 64 technical, clerical and administrative employees at a large U.S. university. Employees were given PDAs and an apparatus to measure their blood pressure at several time points throughout the day for a period of two weeks.  On days in which employees reported having higher workloads, they also experienced higher levels of distress at work and had higher blood pressure readings. Higher workloads were also associated with lower perceptions of well-being at the end of the work day.

The good news is that the unfavorable effects of workload tend to be much less dramatic for employees who perceive that they have more control over their work and employees who perceive that their organization values their contributions (i.e., perceived organizational support).

On the other hand, heavy workloads seem to have a very serious effect on employees who have little control over their work and feel that the organization does not value their work.

One important implication of Ilies et al.’s findings is that workload may ultimately lead to very serious psychological and physical health issues in the long run (e.g., increased blood pressure can lead to cardiovascular disease).  While it seems that our workloads continue to increase over time, organizations should note that the greater degree of control employees have over their work and the degree to which their employees feel that they support them and value their contributions seems to diminish the negative effects of heavy workloads.

Ilies, R., Dimotakis, N., & De Pater, I.E. (2010). Psychological and physiological reactions to high workloads: Implications for well-being. Personnel Psychology, 63(2), 407-436.