Content uploaded by Peter Warr
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Peter Warr on Apr 19, 2019
Content may be subject to copyright.
The Measurement of Well-Being and Other Aspects of Mental Health
Abstract
New instruments are described for the measurement of both job-related and non-job mental health. These cover two axes of affective well-being, based upon dimensions of pleasure and arousal, and also reported competence, aspiration and negative job carry-over. Baseline data are presented from a sample of 1686 job-holders, and earlier uses of the well-being scales are summarized. The instruments appear to be psychometrically acceptable, and are associated with demographic and occupational features in expected ways. For example, older employees report greater job-related well-being; occupational level is positively correlated with job depression-enthusiasm but negatively associated with job anxiety-contentment; depression-enthusiasm is more predictable from low-to-medium opportunity for skill use and task variety, whereas anxiety-contentment is more a function of workload or uncertainty.
... The Quality of Professional Life affects the well-being and health of the individual and can influence job performance, commitment, and response to work demands. High Quality of Professional Life typically leads to greater satisfaction, happiness, and energy at work and can enhance productivity and job performance (Warr, 1990) [28] . The factors influencing the Quality of Professional Life are many and vary for each individual. ...
... The Quality of Professional Life affects the well-being and health of the individual and can influence job performance, commitment, and response to work demands. High Quality of Professional Life typically leads to greater satisfaction, happiness, and energy at work and can enhance productivity and job performance (Warr, 1990) [28] . The factors influencing the Quality of Professional Life are many and vary for each individual. ...
This research focuses on the level of Compassion Satisfaction, Professional Burnout, and Secondary Traumatic Stress of Primary and Secondary Education Teachers. The significance of the study lies in addressing the negative impact of burnout on teachers' well-being and educational performance. The findings reveal relatively high levels of Compassion Satisfaction, while displaying lower levels of Professional Burnout and Secondary Traumatic Stress. The study proposes solutions, including improved training, increased support, and better working conditions, with potential contributions to policy development. The research aligns with existing literature, utilizing the Professional Quality of Life (ProQoL) questionnaire by Stamm (2009) [23], also translated into Greek. Despite limitations, such as reliance on self-reported data, the research provides valuable insights and sets the stage for further exploration into teacher well-being and burnout.
... Professional well-being is a multifaceted construct significantly influencing educators' personal fulfillment, job satisfaction, and effectiveness in educational roles. By addressing the various dimensions of professional well-being and implementing supportive interventions, educational institutions can create environments that prioritize educators' holistic development and facilitate positive outcomes for both educators and students (Ryff & Keyes, 1995;Warr, 1990). Professional well-being comprises dimensions such as emotional well-being, autonomy, and purpose in life. ...
This study aims to test the effect of a program intended to promote personal and professional well-being for kindergarten teachers. The program is based on positive psychology and social-emotional learning (SEL) principles. Seventy-seven kindergarten teachers from Israel participated in the study. The research tools used were four questionnaires that had to be filled out at the program's beginning and end. The results indicate that the program was able to promote the personal and professional well-being of kindergarten teachers, lower the level of stress they experience in their work, and increase the degree of job satisfaction. These findings were achieved through practical and applied tools for their daily and professional lives based on the PARMA model of positive psychology and the SEL model. The research findings have an important value in raising awareness of the issue and implementing similar programs as an integral part of the training processes of kindergarten teachers and their professional development processes.
... Our framework describes criteria for having a good versus bad day at work and factors that contribute to having a good versus bad day at work. With respect to the outcome criteria, we focus on affective well-being (Warr, 1990) as the hedonic component within broader well-being conceptualizations (Ryan & Deci, 2001). We build on the circumplex model of affect (Russell, 1980) that captures essential dimensions of subjective well-being in organizations (Bakker & Oerlemans, 2011) and incorporates both positive and negative affective states of high and low activation. ...
Workdays are the main temporal building blocks of people's experiences at work, and many factors potentially contribute to having a good versus a bad day at work. Still, empirical findings on these ingredients are scattered and a bigger picture is missing. This article reviews day-level and experience-sampling studies (k = 382 studies) to describe what makes for a good versus bad day at work. We derive outcome criteria for good versus bad days from the circumplex model of effect and identify specific pre-work factors (sleep, pre-work events, and pre-work experiences) and at-work factors (situational conditions, states and experiences, behaviors, results of one's actions, and work breaks) as their core ingredients. We highlight temporal trends in this rapidly growing research area and critically assess the current state of the literature with respect to theoretical and methodological issues. We link empirical findings that have emerged from our literature review to a homeostatic human sustainability perspective, offer directions for future research, and discuss the practical implementation of research findings.
... Os dados recolhidos resultaram da aplicação de um questionário, tendo sido utilizado um questionário sociodemográfico e as Escalas: Cultura organizacional (adaptação do Focus de Neves, 2007), a Escala Bem-estar afectivo Multi-Affect Indicator(IWP) (Warr, 1990), a Escala Satisfação geral com o trabalho (Warr, Cook & Wall, 1979) e a Escala de Ajustamento Pessoa-Organização (Cable e Judge, 1995). A amostra de conveniência foi constituída por 15 colaboradores do sexo feminino, com idades compreendidas entre os 43 e os 64 anos. ...
... Affective employee well-being, defined as the frequency and intensity of unpleasant or pleasant emotional workplace experiences (Duffy et al., 2016;Warr, 1990), presents a concern of critical importance to organizations seeking to foster amicable and sustainable working environments (Warr, 1999). A desire to develop well-being has led to an increased focus on its enhancement in organizations and in wider society (Sonnentag, 2015). ...
In the literature on the antecedents and mediators of employee well-being, there is little or no acknowledgement of sudden changes in the social and environmental context in which perceptions of well-being are formed. Contextual influences are rarely so impactful and unexpected as those associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. To continue operating within lockdown restrictions, many organizations, apart from those unable or unwilling to initiate such changes, abruptly adopted a work from home (WFH) or hybrid working pattern. These circumstances raise novel questions about the influence of impactful, unanticipated contextual factors on employee well-being outcomes. To address these questions in the context of a shift to WFH, we tested a model adapted from aspects of Event Systems Theory (EST) and the Psychology of Working Theory (PWT). Central to our theoretical adaptation was a unique perspective on PWT “decent work” perceptions based on principles of empowerment. In a study of 337 employees during the lockdown period, we applied a Bayesian multilevel model to investigate the contrast between in-lockdown perceptions relative to current pre-lockdown perceptions. Results suggested the contextual shift to WFH related negatively to relative perceptions of well-being, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment. Empowerment significantly mediated all well-being outcomes. Organizational support, neuroticism, and home readiness related directly to empowerment and indirectly to well-being outcomes via empowerment. We discuss how sudden contextual changes interacted with relationships observed in our model, and how our findings progress a context-responsive adaptation of EST and PWT in the new world of WFH.
Recovery from work is highly relevant for employees, yet understanding the interpersonal antecedents of impaired recovery experiences remains unclear. Specifically, because former research neglected supervisor behaviors as a predictor of impaired recovery and abusive supervision is a core stressor, we examine daily abusive supervision as a predictor of subordinates’ recovery experiences (i.e., psychological detachment and relaxation). We draw on research on the recovery paradox and propose that psychological detachment and relaxation will be impaired on days with high abusive supervision, although recovery would have been highly important on those days. We suggest a cognitive mechanism (via rumination) and an affective mechanism (via anger) to explain this paradox. We test coworker reappraisal support as a moderator that buffers the adverse effects of abusive supervision on rumination and anger. In a daily diary study (171 subordinates, 786 days), we found an indirect effect of abusive supervision on psychological detachment via rumination and indirect effects of abusive supervision on psychological detachment and relaxation via anger. Coworker reappraisal support moderated the association of abusive supervision and rumination, such that the relationship was weaker when coworker support was high. Our results suggest that including negative supervisor behaviors, such as abusive supervision, in recovery research is highly relevant. Coworkers can help cognitively process abusive-supervision experiences by providing reappraisal support.
This study investigates how perceived work from home (WFH) stress affects job and life satisfaction and the role of specific personal and job resources in stress and job and life satisfaction for WFH employees. The rising demand for WFH due to the COVID-19 pandemic has caused significant changes in employees’ job and overall life satisfaction. We conducted a quantitative survey of 283 first-time WFH employees in Bangladesh, applied the job demands–resources (JD-R) and conservation of resources (COR) theories, and employed a partial least squares–structural equation model. The results indicate that high stress resulting from WFH reduces job and life satisfaction; under such unusual work conditions, job satisfaction is a strong predictor of life satisfaction. Moreover, the effects of personal resources, such as job competence and perceived hope, on life satisfaction become operational through perceived supervisor support, perceived WFH stress and job satisfaction. Our study contributed to the literature by applying the JD-R and COR theories in a new WFH context to suggest that job resources, such as perceived supervisor support, become more effective when an employee is exposed to WFH for the first time, and some personal resources, such as job competence, become dependent on job resources.
Purpose
The organizational environment can influence how employees experience meaningfulness. This study examines the mediating role of meaningful work between organizational ethical climates and the affective well-being of employees. We also test for the moderating role of self-regulatory traits in this relationship.
Design/methodology/approach
Partial least squares – structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) was employed to test the hypothesized model using responses from 430 working professionals. Recommended robustness checks were conducted before model assessment and hypotheses testing.
Findings
The findings suggest that a caring ethical climate is positively related to affective well-being. Meaningful work dimensions, i.e. unity with others, inspiration and balancing tensions partially mediate the relationship between the caring climate and affective well-being. Integrity with self and balancing tensions fully mediate the negative effect of an instrumental climate on affective well-being. Positive mediation of unity with others and negative mediation of reality were observed between a law and code climate and affective well-being. Moderating effects of self- and other-orientation and self-monitoring were also observed.
Research limitations/implications
The study presents significant insights, however, a few limitations must be discussed. The study has relied on cross-sectional data which may be addressed in future studies.
Practical implications
In times when organizations are spending in large amounts in ensuring meaningful work and employee well-being, this study suggests internal mechanisms that can bring positive impact in employees' work life. Leaders should assess how employees perceive the ethical climate of the organization in order to provide better meaningful work opportunities to the workforce.
Social implications
Having meaningful work and experiencing affective well-being are significant for a collective betterment of society. Meaningful work encourages individuals in identifying how their work if affecting the society. A affectively happy workforce is essential in building a mentally healthy society.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the investigation of organizational factors that help employees find meaning in their work. Based on ethical climate theory, this study highlights how organizations can redesign and modify their ethical climates to provide opportunities for employees to experience meaningful work and improve their affective well-being.
Presents an integrative theoretical framework to explain and to predict psychological changes achieved by different modes of treatment. This theory states that psychological procedures, whatever their form, alter the level and strength of self-efficacy. It is hypothesized that expectations of personal efficacy determine whether coping behavior will be initiated, how much effort will be expended, and how long it will be sustained in the face of obstacles and aversive experiences. Persistence in activities that are subjectively threatening but in fact relatively safe produces, through experiences of mastery, further enhancement of self-efficacy and corresponding reductions in defensive behavior. In the proposed model, expectations of personal efficacy are derived from 4 principal sources of information: performance accomplishments, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and physiological states. Factors influencing the cognitive processing of efficacy information arise from enactive, vicarious, exhortative, and emotive sources. The differential power of diverse therapeutic procedures is analyzed in terms of the postulated cognitive mechanism of operation. Findings are reported from microanalyses of enactive, vicarious, and emotive modes of treatment that support the hypothesized relationship between perceived self-efficacy and behavioral changes. (21/2 p ref)
Factor-analytic evidence has led most psychologists to describe affect as a set of dimensions, such as displeasure, distress, depression, excitement, and so on, with each dimension varying independently of the others. However, there is other evidence that rather than being independent, these affective dimensions are interrelated in a highly systematic fashion. The evidence suggests that these interrelationships can be represented by a spatial model in which affective concepts fall in a circle in the following order: pleasure (0), excitement (45), arousal (90), distress (135), displeasure (180), depression (225), sleepiness (270), and relaxation (315). This model was offered both as a way psychologists can represent the structure of affective experience, as assessed through self-report, and as a representation of the cognitive structure that laymen utilize in conceptualizing affect. Supportive evidence was obtained by scaling 28 emotion-denoting adjectives in 4 different ways: R. T. Ross's (1938) technique for a circular ordering of variables, a multidimensional scaling procedure based on perceived similarity among the terms, a unidimensional scaling on hypothesized pleasure–displeasure and degree-of-arousal dimensions, and a principal-components analysis of 343 Ss' self-reports of their current affective states. (70 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
A 20-item Stress Adjective Checklist (MacKay et al., 1978) was administered to 565 Canadian undergraduate psychology students and factor analyzed. A 4-factor solution was discarded as it could not be replicated. Both the 3-factor and 2-factor solutions were replicable and interpretable. The 3-factor solution comprised one bipolar and two correlated, monopolar factors, whereas the 2-factor solution contained two uncorrelated, bipolar factors. The 2-factor solution (stress and arousal) was chosen because it was felt that two factors better represented the affect domain and that the 3-factor solution (containing monopolar factors) may be an artifact of the methodology, that is, response scale asymmetry, scale imbalance and social desirability. The 2-factor solution was very similar to that found in British and Australian samples (King et al., 1983; MacKay et al., 1978) and supports the view of Russell (1979, 1980) that affect space is bipolar. Results are contrary to the view of Nowlis (1965) and Thayer (1967) and others, who argue in favor of monopolar factors. Suggestions for further research and refinement of the scale are made.
The principal aim of this book is to propose and apply a broad-ranging model of some environmental determinants of mental health. The features to be considered may be studied in any environment, but particular attention will be paid to the settings of paid work and unemployment. It will be argued that mental health in both these settings is determined by the same environmental characteristics. The harmful features of some jobs are also those which cause deterioration in unemployment, and the factors which are beneficial in jobs can also enhance mental health during unemployment.
The framework to be developed has three major parts. The first two are what McGuire (1983) has described as "categorical" and "process" theories.
The third part of the overall framework addresses the interaction between persons and situations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)