Clarifying the dynamic interrelation of conflicts between the work and home domain and counterproductive work behaviour

This study investigates the daily relationship between experiencing home–work conflict (HWC) and an employee’s performance of counterproductive work behaviour (CWB) directed towards the individual (CWBI) and CWB directed towards the organization (CWBO). Moreover, we examine whether these relationships are buffered by family supportive supervisor behaviour. Finally, we investigate whether CWBs directed towards the individual and the organization are related to feelings of work–home conflict (WHC). We examined the daily diary data using multilevel path analyses. We found support for a significant positive relation between HWC and same as well as next-day CWB enacted towards the individual, and same-day CWB directed towards the organization. General levels of family supportive supervisor behaviour buffered an employee’s daily relationship between experiencing HWC and enacting counterproductive work behaviour towards the individual, and are directly and negatively related with enacting CWB towards the individual and the organization. Furthermore, daily CWB enacted towards the individual was significantly positive, whereas CWB enacted towards the organization was significantly negatively related to WHC. Future research would benefit from examining buffering effects on the resource-depleting relationship between counterproductive work behaviour enacted towards the individual and WHC.     

Job crafting for lean engagement: The interplay of day and job-level characteristics

The quality of working life under the production system known as lean manufacturing (LM) is a heavily debated topic. Little is known about the engagement level of employees under this system. Our study is concerned with how employees in this context craft their jobs to enhance their own engagement, and we specifically consider how daily skill utilization triggers this process. Using a cross-level perspective, we further consider whether job-level characteristics relevant to the lean context, namely task interdependence and boundary control, restrict or facilitate the effects of daily skill utilization. A daily diary study was conducted over 4 working days with 64 employees in a large company utilizing LM. The results of multilevel structural equation modelling demonstrated that on a given day, skill utilization was associated with seeking resources, and this relationship was stronger when employees had high boundary control and low task interdependence in their general job roles. Results further demonstrated that employees experienced higher work engagement on days when they sought resources and challenges. Our findings illustrate the motivational potential of job crafting under LM and how crafting activities can be facilitated by the design of jobs and allocation of daily tasks.     

Linking daily ethical leadership to followers’ daily behaviour: the roles of daily work engagement and previous abusive supervision

The aim of this study was to advance literature on ethical leadership towards its day-level application. Daily ethical leadership is defined as ethical leadership behaviours a leader exhibits on a given day. Beneficial effects of daily ethical leadership on daily helping behaviour and daily counterproductive work behaviour via daily work engagement were examined. Furthermore, yesterday’s abusive supervision was postulated to moderate the impact of today’s ethical leadership on work engagement indicating moderated mediation. The relationship between daily ethical leadership and daily work engagement should be stronger when previous abusive supervision was high. This model was tested using an experience sampling methodology spread over 5 working days. The sample consisted of 241 employees from different organizations. Results supported the beneficial indirect impact of daily ethical leadership on daily helping through strengthening daily work engagement. The indirect effect was non-significant for daily counterproductive work behaviour. Consistent with theoretical assumptions, both indirect effects were strongest with high previous abusive supervision and diminished when previous abusive supervision was low. Implications for leadership research and managerial practice are discussed.     

Reliability of measures of work engagement and psychological well-being among South African state security forces

This study reports on the psychometric properties of measures of work engagement and psychological well-being in the South African state security forces. The research sample consisted of a combined sample of 178 soldiers and 57 police officers (34% females). They completed a battery of measures of work engagement and psychological well-being. Results following exploratory and reliability analysis suggest the scores from the measures to be reliable for research use with the South African security services.     

Contribution d’une catégorisation des RPS à la prédiction du stress et du burnout (ou du mal-être au travail) des soignants

Health-care professionals are strongly affected by distress at work. Our goal is to study the usefulness of a psychosocial risk measure, compared to a measure of psychosocial and organizational work constraints, on the prediction of distress among a population of caregivers. This measure is based on the categorization of psychosocial risk factors issued from the College of experts chaired by Gollac. Seven hundred and fifty-seven health-care professionals filled out a questionnaire composed of measures of psychosocial risks, psychosocial and organizational work constraints specific to caregivers, as well as stress and burnout. Results indicate that the measure of psychosocial risk better predicted the levels of stress and burnout than the measure of psychosocial and organizational work constraints.     

The coordination of shoulder girdle muscles during repetitive arm movements at either slow or fast pace among women with or without neck-shoulder pain

Purpose: The aim of this study was to evaluate the coordination of the shoulder girdle muscles among subjects with or without neck-shoulder pain performing repetitive arm movement at either a slow or fast pace. Methods: Thirty female adults were allocated to one of two groups—healthy controls or cases with neck-shoulder pain. Surface electromyography (sEMG) signals from the clavicular, acromial, middle and lower trapezius portions and the serratus anterior muscles were recorded during a task performed for 20 min at a slow pace and 20 min at a fast pace. The root mean square (RMS), relative rest time (RRT) and normalised mutual information (NMI, an index of functional connectivity between two muscles in a pair) were computed. Results: No significant differences on RMS, RRT and NMI were found between groups. For both groups, the fast movement pace resulted in increased levels of RMS, lower degrees of RRT and higher NMI compared to the slow pace. No interaction between group and movement pace was found. Conclusions: This study highlights the change in sEMG activity of muscles to meet the demands of performing a task at fast movement pace. The fast pace imposed a higher muscle demand evidenced by increased sEMG amplitude, low degree of muscle rest and increased functional connectivity for subjects in both the case and control groups. No indication of impaired sEMG activity was found in individuals with neck-shoulder pain.     

Autistic Heterogeneity: Linking Uncertainties and Indeterminacies

Autism is a highly uncertain entity and little is said about it with any degree of certainty. Scientists must, and do, work through these uncertainties in the course of their work. Scientists explain uncertainty in autism research through discussion of epistemological uncertainties which suggest that diverse methods and techniques make results hard to reconcile, ontological uncertainties which suggest doubt over taxonomic coherence, but also through reference to autism’s indeterminacy which suggests that the condition is inherently heterogeneous. Indeed, indeterminacy takes two forms—an inter-personal form which suggests that there are fundamental differences between individuals with autism and an intra-personal form which suggests that no one factor is able to explain all features of autism within a given individual. What is apparent in the case of autism is that scientists put uncertainty and indeterminacy into discussion with one another and, rather than a well-policed epistemic-ontic boundary, there is a movement between, and an entwinement of, the two. Understanding scientists’ dialogue concerning uncertainty and indeterminacy is of importance for understanding autism and autistic heterogeneity but also for understanding uncertainty and ‘uncertainty work’ within science more generally.     

Interrole conflict and self-efficacy to manage work and family demands mediate the relationships of job and family demands with stress in the job and family domains

Background and objectives: This study derives from Work–Home Resources model (ten Brummelhuis, L. L., & Bakker, A. B. (2012). A resource perspective on the work–home interface: The work–home resources model. American Psychologist, 67(7), 545–556. doi:10.1037/a0027974) and Social Cognitive Theory (Bandura, A. (1986). Social foundations of thought and action: A social cognitive theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US: Prentice-Hall, Inc.) to investigate mechanisms responsible for the effect of job and family demands on work- and family-related perceived stress. We hypothesized that interrole conflict and self-efficacy to manage work and family demands operate either independently or sequentially transmitting the effects of demands on perceived stress. Design: A sample of 100 employees of various occupations participated in the study conducted online in two waves: Time 1 (T1) and Time 2 (T2) with a three-month interval. Method: Regression analysis with bootstrapping was applied. Results: Interrole conflict (T1) did not mediate the relationships between demands (T1) and perceived stress (T2), whereas self-efficacy (T1) mediated only those between family demands (T1) and stress (T2). However, data supported the sequential mediation hypotheses: Demands (T1) were associated with increased interrole conflict (T1) which in turn decreased self-efficacy (T1) and ultimately resulted in the elevated perceived stress at work and in the family (T2). Conclusions: Demands originating in one domain can impact stress both in the same and other life areas through the sequence of interrole conflict and context-specific self-efficacy.