Is too much work engagement detrimental? Linear or curvilinear effects on mental health and job performance.

Akihito Shimazu,Norito Kawakami,Kazumi Kubota,Wilmar B Schaufeli,Kazuhiro Watanabe,Dana Unger

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0208684

Abstract

Most studies report a positive relationship of work engagement with health and job performance, but, occasionally, a “dark side of engagement” has also been uncovered. The current study examined two hypotheses: whether work engagement has (1) a U-shaped curvilinear relation with psychological distress and (2) an inverted U-shaped curvilinear relation with job performance (i.e., in-role performance and creative behavior). A two-wave longitudinal Internet survey with a time lag of seven months was conducted among 1,967 Japanese employees. To test our hypotheses, we used a two-wave panel design and examined the lagged and concurrent relations between work engagement and both outcomes. The results confirmed that work engagement had a curvilinear relation with psychological distress concurrently; a favorable effect was found initially, but this disappeared at intermediate levels of work engagement, and, at higher levels, an adverse effect became prominent. In addition, work engagement had a curvilinear relation with in-role performance both concurrently and longitudinally; the higher the levels of work engagement, the stronger the favorable effects on in-role performance. However, contrary to our expectations, work engagement had a linear relation with psychological distress longitudinally and with creative behavior both concurrently and longitudinally. Hence, our results suggest that work engagement plays a different role in health enhancement compared to performance enhancement. Leveling-off and adverse effects of high work engagement were observed for psychological distress in the short and not in a long run. In contrast, no leveling-off effect of high work engagement was observed for job performance. Thus, except for the short-term effect on psychological distress, no dark side of work engagement was observed for psychological distress and job performance.

Highlights

A host of studies suggests that work engagement, which is defined as “a positive, fulfilling, work-related state of mind that is characterized by vigor, dedication, and absorption” [1], is beneficial in nature
This study focused on psychological distress as an indicator of health and in-role performance and creative behavior as indicators of job performance, because previous studies that investigated linear effect of work engagement in cross-sectional and longitudinal designs focused on those three outcomes intensively [27, 28, 29]
We conducted confirmatory factor analyses to examine the discriminant validity of the constructs of interest in each survey (T1 and Time 2 (T2))

Summary

Introduction

A host of studies suggests that work engagement, which is defined as “a positive, fulfilling, work-related state of mind that is characterized by vigor, dedication, and absorption” [1], is beneficial in nature. Research suggests that work engagement is beneficial for employees’ job performance, and, for organizations. Virtually all studies on the relationships between work engagement and indicators of health and job performance assume that these relations are linear in nature (the only exception was Caesens et al [22], who examined the curvilinear relations). This means that when levels of engagement are increasing (or decreasing) levels of health and job performance are increasing (or decreasing) at the same rate. This study focused on psychological distress as an indicator of health and in-role performance and creative behavior as indicators of job performance, because previous studies that investigated linear effect of work engagement in cross-sectional and longitudinal designs focused on those three outcomes intensively [27, 28, 29]

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion