The Changing Value of Skill Utilisation: Interactions with Job Demands on Job Satisfaction and Absenteeism

Opportunities to learn and apply new skills are generally considered a favourable job characteristic, but can there be too much of a good thing? In this paper, we draw on vitamin and resource perspectives to investigate a more nuanced perspective on where, when and why skill utilisation delivers value as a resource. Specifically, we examine whether skill utilisation exhibits non-linear relationships with job satisfaction and absenteeism in the presence of two different job demands: task workload, which captures the quantitative demands of work, and surface acting, which captures the qualitative demands of work. Using data from 278 hospital employees, we found that surface acting moderated the non-linear relationship between skill utilisation and absenteeism. Specifically, the relationship between skill utilisation and absenteeism became increasingly positive when surface acting was high, but not when surface acting was low. Interestingly, the linear relationship between skill utilisation and job satisfaction was less positive when surface acting was high. Task workload did not interact with skill utilisation to predict employee outcomes. Our findings highlight complexities in the relationship between job resources and demands and show that the value of skill utilisation changes under demanding conditions.     

Enduring cognitive dysfunction in unipolar major depression: A test–retest study using the Stroop paradigm

Hammar, Å., Sørensen, L., Årdal, G., Oedegaard, K.J., Kroken, R., Roness, A. & Lund, A. (2009). Enduring cognitive dysfunction in unipolar major depression: A test–retest study using the Stroop‐paradigm. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology. The aim of the study was to investigate automatic and effortful information processing with the Stroop paradigm in a long term perspective in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD). Patients were tested at two test occasions: at inclusion with a Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) score >18, and after 6 months, when most patients had experienced symptom reduction. The Stroop paradigm is considered to measure aspects of attention and executive functioning and consists of three conditions/cards: naming the color of the patches (Color), reading of the color‐words (Word) and naming the ink color of color‐words (Color‐Word). The Color‐Word condition is proved to be the most cognitive demanding task and requires the proband to actively suppress interference and is therefore considered to require more effortful information processing, whereas naming the color of the patches and reading the color‐words are expected to be more automatic and less cognitive demanding. A homogenous group of 19 patients with unipolar recurrent MDD according to DSM‐IV and a HDRS score of >18 were included in the study. A control group was individually matched for age, gender and level of education. Depressed patients performed equal to the control group on the Color and Word cards at both test occasions. However, the patients were impaired compared with the control group on the Color‐Word card task at both test occasions. Thus, the depressed patients showed no improvement of effortful attention/executive performance as a function of symptom reduction. The results indicate that the depressed patients showed impaired cognitive performance on cognitive demanding tasks when symptomatic and that this impairment prevailed after 6 months, despite significant improvement in their depressive symptoms.     

Suicide in pregnancy: the Hedda Gabler syndrome.

A review of forty-seven suicides in women of child-bearing age revealed that two women were pregnant, two were within the first year post-partum and two falsely believed themselves pregnant. The search revealed two additional pregnancy-associated suicides which had not been reported as suicide. Previous studies asserting that pregnancy protects against suicide would seem to be challenged by these data. Pregnancy-related suicides are similar to each other and to the literary suicide of Hedda Gabler and fit into a continuum of pregnancy-related disorders.