Promoting personal resources and reducing exhaustion through positive work reflection among caregivers.

The aim of this study was to test the effects of a daily positive work reflection intervention on fostering personal resources (i.e., hope and optimism) and decreasing exhaustion (i.e., emotional exhaustion and fatigue) among caregivers for the elderly and caregivers who provide services at patients' homes. Using an intervention/waitlist control group design, 46 caregivers in an intervention group were compared with 44 caregivers in a control group at 3 points of measurement: pre-intervention, post-intervention, and at a 2-week follow-up. The results show that emotional exhaustion and fatigue were reduced for the intervention group. Primarily, caregivers with a high need for recovery at baseline benefited from the intervention. The results reveal no intervention effects for personal resources; however, they reveal a trend that the intervention led to an increase in hope and optimism among caregivers with a high need for recovery. Overall, the findings show that caregivers benefit from a daily positive work reflection intervention, particularly when their baseline levels of resources and well-being are low. (PsycINFO Database Record

Demands, control, and support: a meta-analytic review of work characteristics interrelationships.

The job demands-control-support model (DCS; Karasek, 1979) is an influential theory for understanding how work characteristics relate to employee well-being, health, and performance. However, previous research has largely neglected theory-building regarding the interrelationships between job demands, control, and support. We remedy such theoretical underdevelopment by reviewing and integrating theory on the relationships between demands, control, and support to develop five hypotheses. We test our hypotheses within a meta-analytic framework using a set of 106 studies. Our results show negative demands-supervisor support and demands-coworker support relationships, but no significant demand-control relationship. Our findings also indicate positive control-supervisor support and control-coworker support relationships. Using the meta-analytic effect sizes, we also estimate two competing structural equation models intended to discern which theoretical model using DCS work characteristics to predict occupational strain and well-being is more consistent with our data. Our results suggest that job control and both sources of social support should be treated independently, as opposed to indicators of a shared latent factor, in terms of their prediction of well-being and job demands. Our study offers support for the usefulness of the DCS and more modern conceptualizations of the working environment in understanding the employee work experience and for predicting important work outcomes. (

Consequences of job insecurity and the moderator role of occupational group.

In recent decades, transformations in organizations and the labour market have produced an increase in employee job insecurity. In response to this situation, workers present different negative reactions. However, the intensity of these reactions varies across studies that have investigated the outcomes of job insecurity. One possible explanation for this inconsistency may lie in the influence of other factors, such as the occupational group (Sverke et al., 2002). The aim of this study is to provide additional evidence about the relationship between job insecurity and its outcomes (i.e., life satisfaction, job satisfaction, perceived performance and organizational commitment), and examine the moderator role of occupational group in this relationship. The sample was composed of 321 employees from different Spanish organizations. The results showed that job insecurity was directly and negatively related to life satisfaction, job satisfaction and organizational commitment, and they suggest that occupational group moderated relations between job insecurity and three studied outcomes. In the case of life satisfaction and perceived performance, this relationship was stronger among blue collar workers. The relationship between job insecurity and job satisfaction was stronger in white collar workers. The implications and limitations of this study are discussed.