Abstract
ObjectiveTo examine three levels of need for recovery (NFR) after work in relation to effort from work demands, demand compensatory strategies, effort-moderating or -reversing resources, and health including health behaviors. A further purpose was to examine occupational characteristics determining NFR.Methods5000 engineers, carpenters, nurses, and home care nurses were invited to participate. NFR k-means clusters were calculated from 1289 participants. The effect from three levels of NFR regarding demands, compensatory strategies, resources at work, health, and health behaviors was examined using analysis of variance (ANOVA) and post hoc analysis. Prevalence ratios (PRs) of suboptimal health for three levels of NFR were calculated using Poisson regression. Linear stepwise multiple regression predictors explaining NFR were examined also occupation wise.ResultsNFR centroids at 5.8/33, 13.1/33, and 21.0/33 points were identified. ANOVA showed corresponding effects from NFR levels on work demands and compensatory strategies. The inversed proportion concerned levels of resources at work. Only the low NFR cluster negated regular health effects. The other two cluster groups also repeatedly worked while ill and presented PRs concerning health effects from 1.9 to 3.9 when compared to the low NFR group. Making good quality work, recovery opportunities, and thinking of work when off work were the most important predictors of NFR among 1289 participants with also occupation-wise interpretable profiles.ConclusionsThree levels of NFR meant corresponding levels of work demands, work-demand compensatory strategies, and unfavorable health behaviors. An inversed proportion of resources related to the same levels of NFR. Low NFR meant no regular health effects which could guide limit values regarding salutary NFR. Important predictors of NFR were resources making a good quality work, recovery opportunities, and reversely effort from rumination when off work. Occupation-wise predictors could guide interventions.
Highlights
The relationship between self-reported unfavorable working conditions and severe health consequences such as cardiovascular disease (e.g., Kivimäki and Kawachi 2015) has been repeatedly established
That the need for recovery (NFR) measure meaningfully represents the time frame of recovery was subsequently confirmed by Schuring et al (2004), who mapped the effect from scheduling of free time between work shifts in the transport sector
The comparison between the two groups that either often experienced NFR or sometimes experienced NFR(in-between group) and the less than sometimes experiencing NFR (low NFR) group showed that the two former groups at two different levels reported distinctly higher demands and distinctly lower available effort-moderating and cumulative effort-reversing resources at work than the low NFR
Summary
The relationship between self-reported unfavorable working conditions and severe health consequences such as cardiovascular disease (e.g., Kivimäki and Kawachi 2015) has been repeatedly established. The fact of job demands creating effort may be represented by workload, such as needing to work extra hard to manage the work demands, physical demands, emotional demands, and by work–home interference, such as difficulty managing domestic obligations because of scheduling (e.g. Van den Broeck et al 2008) To these acknowledged causes of effort resulting from job demands, for example, Aronsson et al (2013) add work demand-related suboptimal individual coping strategies, termed compensating strategies. Reported working conditions, work-demand compensating strategies, and effects on health including health behaviors were linked together and associated with the grouped individuals From this latter analysis a pattern emerged, where the “not recovered” cluster group presented “the whole chain of risk factors” from high job demands, insufficient resources to do the work including insufficient support from management. Specific research questions were: 1. How are NFR cluster groups related to work demands and resources doing the work?
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