Robotizing meaningful work
PurposeRobots have a history of replacing human labor in undesirable, dirty, dull and dangerous tasks. With robots now emerging in academic and human-centered work, this paper aims to investigate psychological implications of robotizing desirable and socially rewarding work.Design/methodology/approachTesting the holistic stress model, this study examines educational professionals’ stress responses as mediators between robotization expectations and future optimism in life. The study uses survey data on 2,434 education professionals.FindingsRespondents entertaining robotization expectations perceived their work to be less meaningful and reported more burnout symptoms than those with no roboti…
Do Unnecessary Tasks Impair Performance Because They Harm Living a Calling? : Testing a Mediation in a Three-Wave Study
This three-wave study explored whether living a calling (at work) mediated the relation between unnecessary tasks (time wasting work tasks) and socio-contextual performance at work (cynicism, organizational citizenship behavior). Participants were 518 Finnish white- and blue-collar employees, who were followed up in 2018, 2019, and 2020. The results of structural equation modeling showed that unnecessary tasks at Time 1 related negatively to living a calling at Time 2, which, in turn, related to cynicism and organizational citizenship behavior at T3. Thus, living a calling mediated the relation between unnecessary tasks and the outcomes. We found no evidence for the moderator role of living…
Job Insecurity and Depressive Symptoms in Mothers and Adolescents: A Dyadic Study
AbstractIn this study, we examined whether maternal perceived job insecurity (JI) affected depressive symptoms in their adolescent children. Specifically, we tested a mediator-moderator model in which we hypothesized that maternal JI was related to adolescent depressive symptoms indirectly via maternal depressive symptoms. Most importantly, we also explored whether this indirect path was moderated by two buffering resources, i.e., maternal off-job recovery and adolescent self-esteem. There is little research on the effects of parental JI on adolescent children from the viewpoint of buffering moderators. Due to growing insecurity in the labor markets we need more information about resources …
Meaningful Work Protects Teachers’ Self-Rated Health under Stressors
A sense of meaningfulness is one of the most sought?after work characteristics which has been associated with employees’ well-being. This study explored whether meaningful work enhances self-rated health in challenging work context, under the stressors of distractions, unnecessary tasks, and unreasonable tasks. Data was collected from Finnish teachers (N = 1,658) and structural equation modelling was employed with the latent interaction terms. Results showed that meaningful work was associated with better self-rated health and the stressors were associated with poorer self-rated health. Protective potential of meaningful work against stressors was also discovered, as meaningful work mitigat…
Opening up learning environments : liking school among students in reformed learning spaces
The present study focuses on views of Finnish basic education students on open and flexible learning environments and the extent to which these views are associated with students’ liking of school. The data were based on an online questionnaire containing both structured ratings and open-ended questions filled out by primary school students (n = 684; grades 2–6; between ages 8–13 years) attending reformed learning environments. Ethnographic field notes and photographs of the schools were collected to provide contextual information about the settings. Quantitative analyses indicated that students had mostly positive evaluations of their renewed learning environments. Students’ perception of …
Supplemental Material, Appendix - Do Aging Employees Benefit from Self-Regulative Strategies? A Follow-Up Study
Supplemental Material, Appendix for Do Aging Employees Benefit from Self-Regulative Strategies? A Follow-Up Study by Saija Mauno and Jaana Minkkinen in Research on Aging
Do Older Employees Suffer More from Work Intensification and Other Intensified Job Demands? Evidence from Upper White-Collar Workers
Background: Working life today is characterized by acceleration and intensification due to social, and particularly technological, acceleration affecting the whole of society. These phenomena also affect working life by intensifying job demands, possibly imposing new job stressors on the workforce. At the same time workforce is aging, raising a question how older employees manage to cope with these work life changes. Methods: This study examined intensified job demands and their effects on occupational well-being from the age perspective utilizing Finnish survey data from upper white-collar workers (N = 2,200). Data was analyzed using multivariate analysis of covariance and hierarchical reg…
Supplemental Material, Appendix - Do Aging Employees Benefit from Self-Regulative Strategies? A Follow-Up Study
Supplemental Material, Appendix for Do Aging Employees Benefit from Self-Regulative Strategies? A Follow-Up Study by Saija Mauno and Jaana Minkkinen in Research on Aging
Intensified job demands and job performance : does SOC strategy use make a difference?
We examined intensified job demands (IJDs) and selecting-optimizing-compensating (SOC) strategies as predictors of job performance (task performance, organizational citizenship behavior). We also investigated SOC strategy use as a moderator in the linkages between IJDs and performance. We sampled three disparate occupational groups (N=4,582). We found that certain dimensions of IJDs showed significant associations with the indicators of job performance but there were also scale-based variations in these linkages, depending on the type of performance and on the sub-scale of IJDs. Specifically, some dimensions of IJDs (e.g., work intensification) related to poorer task performance whereas som…
Intensified job demands and job performance: does SOC strategy use make a difference?
We examined intensified job demands (IJDs) and selecting-optimizing-compensating (SOC) strategies as predictors of job performance (task performance, organizational citizenship behavior). We also investigated SOC strategy use as a moderator in the linkages between IJDs and performance. We sampled three disparate occupational groups (N=4,582). We found that certain dimensions of IJDs showed significant associations with the indicators of job performance but there were also scale-based variations in these linkages, depending on the type of performance and on the sub-scale of IJDs. Specifically, some dimensions of IJDs (e.g., work intensification) related to poorer task performance whereas som…
Profiling a spectrum of mental job demands and their linkages to employee outcomes
Substance abuse, conduct disorder (CD) and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are all known risk factors for developing aggressive behaviors, criminality, other psychiatric comorbidity and substance use disorders (SUD). Since early age of onset is important for aggravating the impact of several of these risk factors, the aim of the present study was to investigate whether young adult violent offenders with different patterns of early onset externalizing problems (here: substance use < age 15, ADHD, CD) had resulted in different criminality profiles, substance use problem profiles and psychiatric comorbidity in young adult age. A mixed-method approach was used, combining a varia…
Illegitimate tasks, job crafting and their longitudinal relationships with meaning of work
The aims of this study were twofold: first, to investigate whether illegitimate tasks and job crafting are associated longitudinally with meaning of work, and, second, to explore whether job crafti...
Immigrant status, gender, and school burnout in Finnish lower secondary school students : A longitudinal study
The aim of this longitudinal study among 9223 students from grade 7 and grade 9 (age 13–14 and 15–16) was to assess whether immigrant status and gender are associated with the level and change (slope) in school burnout among lower secondary school students in the Helsinki metropolitan area. Ninety-seven percent of the variation in school burnout was attributable to individual factors. Both the intercept (2.3, p < 0.001) and slope (0.5, p < 0.001) of school burnout were statistically significant. The slope showed increasing school burnout from grades 7–9. School burnout increased more in girls than in boys. Initially apparent higher school burnout among students who had immigrated to …
Ethical dilemmas and well-being in teachers’ work : A three-wave, two-year longitudinal study
The aim of the present longitudinal study was two-fold: First, to explore what kinds of ethical dilemma groups can be identified among Finnish teachers (n = 310) and second, to examine how these groups differ from each other with respect to occupational well-being and recovery from job strain over the two-year follow-up. Using Latent Profile Analysis, three ethical dilemma prevalence groups were identified: rare (27%), occasional (51%), and frequent dilemmas (22%). Teachers in frequent dilemmas group reported highest burnout, however, their recovery from job strain improved and their burnout (exhaustion) diminished over time. To reduce teachers’ ethical dilemmas different approaches are pro…
Does Psychological Detachment From Work Protect Employees under High Intensified Job Demands?
Technological acceleration is intensifying job demands (IJDs), referring to work intensification, intensified job- and career-related planning and decision-making demands, and intensified learning demands at work. IJDs mean new challenges for workers but recovery from work during off-job time through psychological detachment from work may help employees to maintain their well-being in the context of IJDs. The present study examined the associations between IJDs and emotional exhaustion and the buffering role of psychological detachment in these relationships. Cross-sectional data were collected from four Finnish trade unions in 2018 (N = 3,181). Data were analyzed by structural equation mod…
Do aging employees benefit from self-regulative strategies? : A follow-up study
SOC-strategies (selection, optimization, and compensation) are crucial for well-being and adaptation throughout the life course. The workforce is aging rapidly, thus the age-conditional premises of SOC theory require attention. This study explored (1) whether older employees used SOC strategies more often (compared to younger employees), and (2) whether older employees benefited more from SOC strategies in relation to occupational well-being (job burnout, work engagement). The study was based on follow-up data including three occupational subsamples of different age (N = 1,020). There were no significant age-conditional differences in the take-up of SOC strategies. However, older (white-col…
Antecedents of intensified job demands : evidence from Austria
Purpose In order to understand the driving forces behind intensified job demands (IJDs), the purpose of this paper is to examine demographic factors, structural work-related factors, personal and job resources as antecedents of IJDs. Design/methodology/approach The study is based on cross-sectional (n=4,963) and longitudinal (n=2,055) quantitative data sets of Austrian employees. Data sets were analyzed via regression analyses. Findings The results showed that IJDs, as assessed through five sub-dimensions: work intensification, intensified job-related, career-related planning and decision-making demands, intensified demands for skills and for knowledge-related learning, remained fairly sta…
Psychosocial Problems, Indoor Air-Related Symptoms, and Perceived Indoor Air Quality among Students in Schools without Indoor Air Problems: A Longitudinal Study
The effect of students&rsquo
Does work intensification relate to work engagement?
Tutkimuksessa tarkasteltiin työn intensiivistymisen ilmenemismuotojen ja työn imun välisiä yhteyksiä yhdeksän ammattialan aineistossa (N = 7 786). Tutkimus toteutettiin kyselyllä, ja tuloksia analysoitiin regressioanalyyseillä ammattialoittain. Tulokset osoittivat, että yhteydet työn imuun vaihtelivat työn intensiivistymisen eri ilmenemismuotojen ja tason mukaan, mutta osin myös ammattialoittain. Kokemus työtahdin kiristymisestä oli yhteydessä heikompaan työn imuun lähes kaikilla ammattialoilla. Sen sijaan lisääntyneet oppimisvaatimukset työssä olivat joillakin ammattialoilla yhteydessä korkeampaan työn imuun. Toisaalta havaittiin, että työn imu on korkeinta silloin, kun oppimisvaatimukset …
Is work intensification bad for employees? A review of outcomes for employees over the last two decades
Work intensification (WI) is a notable job stressor, which has been hypothesised to result in various negative outcomes for employees. However, earlier empirical studies regarding this stressor hypothesis have not yet been reviewed. Our narrative review focused on the outcomes for employees of WI as a perceived job stressor. Our review was based on selected qualitative and quantitative empirical studies (k = 44) published in peer-reviewed journals between the years 2000 and 2020. Altogether, the findings of these studies showed that WI was related to various negative outcomes for employees, such as impaired well-being and motivation, supporting the stressor hypothesis. Stressful WI manifest…