Abstract
The European steel industry’s workforce is highly heterogeneous and consists of various occupational groups, presumably facing different psychosocial stressors. The few existing studies on the subject mainly focused on physical constraints of blue-collar workers, whereas the supposable psychosocial workload received only little research attention. This is remarkable considering the challenges associated with statutory required risk assessment of psychosocial hazards. Valid measures of hazard analysis must account for various stressors and reliably identify them, also between occupational groups. The present study, based on a sample of blue- and white-collar workers (N = 124) from the European steel industry, aims to provide a first insight into psychosocial stressors and strain at work in this rarely researched industrial sector. Furthermore, two well-known theoretical roadmaps in job analysis are examined regarding their utility for risk assessment in heterogeneous workforces: the German standard version of the Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire (COPSOQ) and the short version of the effort–reward imbalance questionnaire. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses revealed that the COPSOQ was better suited to predict various strain indices in the present sample. Especially stressors relating to socioemotional aspects, such as work-privacy conflict, revealed a reasonable impact, indicating the need for comprehensive solutions at the organizational level instead of solutions focusing on single workplaces. To conclude, a broadly diversified and validated approach in psychosocial risk assessment is needed to adequately assess the variety of psychosocial factors at work and in different occupational groups.
Highlights
Sector-specific characteristics of psychosocial stressors and strain in the European steel industry have rarely been investigated so far
The objectives of this study were [1] to provide insight into the possibly wide-ranged scope of psychosocial work stressors and strain in the European steel industry and [2] to attain information about the utility of the COPOSQ and the Effort–Reward Imbalance (ERI)-questionnaire for psychosocial risk assessment, especially in view of the steel industry’s heterogenous workforce. (2.1) The variance explained by belonging to different working groups was examined, as a sufficient discriminatory power can be informative for determining plausible differences and information about relevant psychosocial factors between occupational groups
We examined which stressors and psychosocial workplace characteristics in terms of the Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire (COPSOQ) and ERI scales predict self-reported strain assessed with the COPSOQ
Summary
Sector-specific characteristics of psychosocial stressors and strain in the European steel industry have rarely been investigated so far. Improvement of Living and Working Conditions [2] concludes that employees working in the metal industry are generally exposed to high physical risks, atypical working hours in terms of shift work, high demands, and low autonomy. In line with these findings, the occupational medical French SUMER survey of the DARES (French Ministry of Labour) emphasizes for example constraints in posture and articular stress, noise pollution, and manual handling of loads as main physical demands [3]. These conditions already illustrate a variety of presumable sources possibly evoking psychosocial stress, especially when keeping in mind that job demands, control and social interactions are known to be potent predictors of adverse work-related outcomes [5,6,7,8,9]
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