Are workers in high-status jobs healthier than others? Assessing Jahoda's latent benefits of employment in two working populations

Abstract

It is known that employment is important for psychological health. The present paper claims that the reasons why employed persons report better well-being than unemployed persons might also explain why those in some occupations report better well-being than others. Jahoda's latent deprivation theory (1982) was that employment provides a number of latent beneficial functions, which she identified as time structure, social contact, collective purpose, identity/status, and activity. We argue that this theory can be extended to account for differences in well-being between occupations with different levels of status. Data from two studies, one conducted on a representative German sample (n=565) and the other from a large-scale online study (n=826), largely support this argument. Group differences in well-being and access to latent benefits were found, and mediation was partly supported. The findings are discussed not only in relation to the latent deprivation model but also in relation to common approaches to job satisfaction and mental health.