Is occupational stress associated with work engagement ?

The occupational stress is associated with dissatisfaction, excessive demand at work and personal factors. Those factors can reduce work performance and can predispose workers to various diseases. Workers' health may be protected if there is encouragement to face challenges, which may lessen the impact on psychological and somatic stress and thus have greater personal and professional satisfaction. The aim of this study was to evaluate the association between occupational stress and work engagement. Participated in this study 457 male and female workers of a metallurgical industry. Subjects answered personal data, and the Job Stress Scale and Utrecht Work Engagement Scale were applied. Results showed an association between occupational stress and work engagement (P=0,001). The way the individual deals with his frustrations, or rather the work engagement, is associated with the occupational stress.     

Trauma symptomatology: implications for return to work

Research has suggested that individuals who experience work related injuries may be at an increased risk for developing trauma symptoms or Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The purpose of this article is to provide a brief overview of PTSD from both a categorical and dimensional perspective and discuss implications for rehabilitation planning with workers with industrial injuries. The negative impact of trauma symptoms and PTSD is profiled according the following four areas that are important for effective career and vocational behavior: (a) making occupational adjustments, (b) adjusting performance to meet specific work demands, (c) utilizing appropriate social and interpersonal skills in the work setting, and (d) meeting the production and time requirements associated with the specific job. Recommendations are then offered to increase the effectiveness of rehabilitation professionals working with industrial injured workers who may be experiencing trauma symptoms or PTSD.     

Leisure,School, and Work Activity Preferences and Their Role in Vocational Identity Development

Elements of an expanded construct of adolescent vocational identity were examined in terms of their interrelationships with each other, as well as relationships with preferences among leisure, school, and work activities, engagement in those activities, and identity status. Investigating a sample of 660 7th through 12th graders, we found that vocational interests, occupational self-efficacy, and occupational prestige were closely associated with each other, with school and leisure interests, and with actual engagement in corresponding (exploratory) activities. We also found that adolescents did not draw significant distinctions between leisure, school, and work activities. The role of school and vocational exploration in adolescents' self-chosen vocational identity is discussed.     

After the “Great Recession”: Excluding “Able-Bodied” Adults from Food Entitlements in the United States

A little-known provision to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), excluding those who are “able-bodied adults without dependents” (ABAWDs) from accessing long-term benefits without conforming to work requirements or eligibility guidelines, was recently reinstated at federal and state levels. States have considerable discretion in implementing the ABAWD provision, resulting in differential access to SNAP benefits. This article provides an analysis of the historical and political context of the ABAWD provision and its relevance to social work. An examination of several states’ different approaches to implementing the ABAWD rule underscores the limits of this policy and the consequent need for social work engagement and advocacy.     

Occupation as therapy for trauma recovery: a case study

In this case study, a young women who has chronic verbal, emotional, and physical abuse and was exposed to repetitive adult acts of abuse as a child initially presented with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) marked by constriction and disconnection, which resulted in her feeling passive and tortured. As part of her occupational therapy intervention, based on the occupational adaptation, psychoanalytic, and recovery frames of reference, she was able to use her skills as a musician and lyricist to work through her trauma by performing heavy metal music. She used work to express emotions and tell and retell her story to audiences eager to hear her. Work helped her develop an identity that allowed her to be active in the world and reach out to others through her music. This case study focuses on the intervention - how music and occupation functioned as a foundation for relieving her PTSD.     

The Occupational Cost of Being Illegal in the United States: Legal Status,Job Hazards,and Compensating Differentials

Considerable research and pervasive cultural narratives suggest that undocumented immigrant workers are concentrated in the most dangerous, hazardous, and otherwise unappealing jobs in U.S. labor markets. Yet, owing largely to data limitations, little empirical work has addressed this topic. Using data from the 2004 and 2008 panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation, we impute legal status for Mexican and Central American immigrants and link their occupations to Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) data on occupational fatalities and occupational hazard data from the U.S. Department of Labor to explore racial and legal status differentials on several specific measures of occupational risk. Results indicate that undocumented workers face heightened exposure to numerous dimensions of occupational hazard – including higher levels of physical strain, exposure to heights, and repetitive motions – but are less exposed than native workers to some of the potentially most dangerous environments. We also show that undocumented workers are rewarded less for employment in hazardous settings, receiving low or no compensating differential for working in jobs with high fatality, toxic materials, or exposure to heights. Overall, this study suggests that legal status plays an important role in determining exposure to job hazard and in structuring the wage returns to risky work.     

Occupational Engagement and Academic Major Satisfaction: Vocational Identity's Mediating Role

This study examined vocational identity as a mediator of the relationship between occupational engagement (i.e., participation in a breadth of activities and interactions) and academic major satisfaction. Furthermore, the authors evaluated whether satisfaction with academic major related to academic success (i.e., grade point average). The mediational model was tested in a sample of undergraduate students (N = 215). Results indicated that occupational engagement significantly predicted academic major satisfaction and that vocational identity fully mediated that relationship. These findings support occupational engagement as an important contributor to adaptive career decision making and encourage research on occupational engagement as an intervention point for career counselors.     

Career Adaptability and Occupational Engagement of Student Veterans

This study examined the specific career‐related behaviors of career adaptability and occupational engagement among student veterans (N = 100). Contrary to expectations, findings showed statistically significant negative correlations between career adaptability resources (control, concern, curiosity, and confidence) and occupational engagement. Multiple regression analyses indicated that the curiosity resource of career adaptability significantly predicted occupational engagement. The findings suggest a need to understand the complexity of career adaptability and occupational engagement in both research and practice for student veterans.     

Work stress and musculoskeletal disorder etiology: The relative roles of psychosocial and physical risk factors

The intense battles preceding the recent promulgation of OSHA's Ergonomics Program Standard serve as a case study demonstrating the growing understanding that MSD causation, development, and exacerbation are the result of the combined contribution of (and possibly interaction between) a wide range of biomechanical and psychosocial stressors. The best designed studies, those that adequately measure both biomechanical and psychosocial exposures, strongly support this hypothesis. Work stress is one of the results of this stressor combination and is part of the physiological pathway to MSDs and a wide range of other occupational diseases. Prevention efforts geared to a single or single class of exposure may be only partly effective, ineffective, or even counter productive. The most effective control strategies are rooted in on-going, participatory ergonomics programs, incorporating a joint labor/management ergonomic team; this blueprint for intervention necessarily addresses the roots of both physical and psychosocial work stress experienced by workers.     

Why resilient workers perform better: The roles of job satisfaction and work engagement

Previous studies have confirmed correlations between resilience and job performance, but surprisingly little is known about the nature of this relationship. This study sheds light on the roles of two important positive dimensions of work-related well-being: job satisfaction and work engagement. Data were collected from 360 Czech workers in helping professions using an online survey. Levels of resilience and perceived job performance were indeed positively associated. Using structural equation modeling, the best-fitting model showed partial mediation by work engagement; conversely, job satisfaction was not found to be a mediator of this relationship. Additionally, the finding that job performance is related more strongly to work engagement than to job satisfaction contributes to the debate about the concurrent validity of job attitudes.     

Educational Ingredients for Occupational Social Work Practice

Abstract

This article reports on the procedures and findings of an exploratory study to determine future educational requirements for engagement in the re-emerging field of occupational social work. This study utilized the “Delphi method” to determine what an informed group of geographically dispersed social work educators and practitioners from across the United States and Canada could agree upon with respect to the educational offerings considered essential in preparation for engaging in occupational social work in the 1990s. A combined total of fifty-one educational ingredients were accorded an above-average priority rating and ranked within the categories of knowledge and skill. With the identification of the items of agreement, a strong basis is provided for sound curriculum planning and development. The study concludes with a discussion of educational issues and implications.     

Treating Suicidality in African American Adolescents with Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy

Methods for preventing adolescent suicide are surveyed, and cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) is explored as a method for serving suicidal African American adolescents. Strengths, limitations, and compatibility of CBT with social work values are examined. Although CBT shows much promise in helping suicidal African American adolescents, research on the efficacy and effectiveness of CBT with this population is lacking. Suicide risk and protective factors and social inequities are evaluated as they relate to African American adolescents generally. In addition to relieving suicidal symptoms, CBT potentially could facilitate social liberation for this population.     

Human resource management,employee engagement,and nonprofit hospital performance

Human resource management (HRM) has been shown to impact organizational performance, but more research is needed on particular human resource (HR) practices in nonprofits and their effect on performance. In this article, we explore one HRM practice argued to influence performance, employee engagement in decision‐making, examining whether involving staff at different levels of a nonprofit affects nonprofit organizational performance. Drawing on data from a 2011 study of nonprofit hospitals, we find employee engagement has a positive influence on managerial and stakeholder perceptions of organizational performance. Employee engagement in decision‐making is also related to objective nonprofit performance measures, although the effects are less consistent. We conclude by discussing the implications of these findings for nonprofit research and practice.     

Case report: a work simulation program for a manual worker with a fracture injury

Work rehabilitation programs targeting different client groups are available in nearly all major hospital occupational therapy departments in Hong Kong. Clients receiving work rehabilitation are referred from various out-patient clinics and other occupational therapists. Those clients experience limitation in work after their injuries or diseases and plan to return to work after rehabilitation. Program objectives are 1) to assist clients to reach maximum work capacity as rapidly as possible 2) to ensure clients return to work safely 3) to improve clients' work readiness. This case report describes an individualized work simulation program at a general hospital in Hong Kong provided for a typical client who is preparing to return to his worker role. Specific job analysis, goals and program rationale for the client are discussed.     

Productive Engagement Among Older Americans: Prevalence,Patterns, and Implications for Public Policy

This study estimates the prevalence of productive engagement among adults aged 60 and over residing in the United States over a nine-year period. We analyze three waves of data from the Americans' Changing Lives Study, which allows the findings to describe the non-institutionalized older American population. Focusing upon five activities—formal paid employment, irregular paid work, unpaid volunteerism, caregiving, and informal assistance to others—we identify changes in the engagement rates, examine the extent to which engagement occurs through single or multiple concurrent activities, and document intra-individual patterns of engagement within and across forms of productive activity, including the continuity, initiation, and cessation of involvement. The findings reveal that late-life productive engagement is widespread, with the majority of older individuals involved in multiple forms of activity concurrently. Non–market-based activities such as caregiving, informal assistance, and volunteering are most prevalent. Initiation and cessation of activities are common and yield more complex patterns and lower rates of non-participation than are revealed in cross-sectional analyses. Time spent in productive engagement is highly variable and exhibits an overall decline across time. We conclude by highlighting policy strategies to increase the availability and quality of opportunities for productive engagement and promote planning for engagement in late life.     

Productive engagement among older Americans: prevalence, patterns, and implications for public policy

This study estimates the prevalence of productive engagement among adults aged 60 and over residing in the United States over a nine-year period. We analyze three waves of data from the Americans' Changing Lives Study, which allows the findings to describe the non-institutionalized older American population. Focusing upon five activities--formal paid employment, irregular paid work, unpaid volunteerism, caregiving, and informal assistance to others--we identify changes in the engagement rates, examine the extent to which engagement occurs through single or multiple concurrent activities, and document intra-individual patterns of engagement within and across forms of productive activity, including the continuity, initiation, and cessation of involvement. The findings reveal that late-life productive engagement is widespread, with the majority of older individuals involved in multiple forms of activity concurrently. Non-market-based activities such as caregiving, informal assistance, and volunteering are most prevalent. Initiation and cessation of activities are common and yield more complex patterns and lower rates of non-participation than are revealed in cross-sectional analyses. Time spent in productive engagement is highly variable and exhibits an overall decline across time. We conclude by highlighting policy strategies to increase the availability and quality of opportunities for productive engagement and promote planning for engagement in late life.     

Implementation of a Collaborative Care Initiative for PTSD and Depression in the Army Primary Care System

Collaborative care models hold promise as a means to improve the Military Health System (MHS) to better meet the mental health needs of U.S. military personnel. This article describes an Army-wide collaborative care initiative, RESPECT-Mil (“Re-engineering Systems of Primary Care Treatment for Depression and PTSD in the Military”), aimed at improving care for soldiers with depression and post traumatic stress disorder. Essential to the implementation of RESPECT-Mil has been the use of a centralized coordinating team to facilitate collaborative care practice and policy activities across the multiple levels of the MHS. The article explores the relevance of collaborative care frameworks to the social work profession and concludes with a discussion of future directions for the social work field to promote greater involvement in the integrated care movement.     

Ethical leadership,intrapreneurship, service innovation performance and work engagement in chambers of commerce and industry

ABSTRACT

The main purpose of this study which examines how it can be more effective in terms of organizational and managerial aspects with chambers of commerce and industry affiliated to The Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey is to analyze the relationships between ethical leadership, work engagement, intrapreneurship, and service innovation behavior. In addition, it is to determine the role of mediation of work engagement effecting on intrapreneurship and service innovation behavior. For this purpose, quantitative analysis methods have been adopted. The data collected from 568 employees who were employed in chambers of commerce and industry operating in Turkey were analyzed. For the validity and reliability of the measurement tools, confirmatory factor analysis, the model’s good fit values and the AMOS Structural Equation Model were used. It was found that ethical leadership had statistically significant effect on employee engagement, intrapreneurship and the subscales of service innovation behavior (employee service innovation behavior and new service development). The results showed that work engagement partially mediated with ethical leadership effecting on intrapreneurship, ethical leadership effecting on the subscales of service innovation behavior. It is thought that the study is important in terms of providing empirical contributions to the ethical leadership, service innovation, intrapreneurship and work engagement literature. Finally, there are some limitations of the study and some suggestions are offered for future studies.