Biron Caroline, Karanika-Murray Maria, Ivers Hans, Salvoni Sandra, Fernet Claude
Department of Management, Université Laval, Québec, QC, Canada.
Center of Research for Sustainable Health-VITAM, Québec, QC, Canada.
Front Psychol. 2021 Oct 28;12:734245. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.734245. eCollection 2021.
The COVID-19 pandemic has led to a significant increase in the proportion of employees for whom teleworking became mandatory. Presenteeism, or the behavior of working while ill, has hardly been studied in the context of telework. The pandemic forced millions of workers to abruptly transition to working from home for a prolonged period of time, leaving employers often unaware of their health status or work capacity of the workers. This change also eroded the work experience itself, the workplace, and their protective impact on both individual health and work outcomes. This study focused on the longitudinal relationships among psychosocial safety climate (PSC), a lead indicator of workplace conditions, psychological demands, an indicator of quality of work, and presenteeism among a representative sample of teleworkers. PSC was expected to have an indirect impact on presenteeism with psychological demands as a mediator of this impact. We collected the data from a representative sample of teleworkers in the first months (T1: April, T2: June, and T3: December 2020) of the pandemic using a three-wave online survey ( = 275). We tested a model of PSC as a determinant of presenteeism in teleworkers with psychological demands as a mediator. A cross-lagged panel model was estimated to test cross-sectional and longitudinal relationships. As expected, psychological demands increased over time. Contrary to expectations, the prevalence of presenteeism remained unchanged while PSC increased over time. The data fully supported the mediating effect of psychological demands such that a higher evaluation of PSC at T1 led to lower psychological demands at T2, which led to reduced presenteeism at T3. We also found a reciprocal relationship, with higher psychological demands at T2 leading to decreased evaluation of PSC at T3. These results show that the perception of teleworkers on their organization as giving a high priority to their psychological health is an important determinant of their work experience, ultimately influencing their decision to work while ill. The context of the pandemic has highlighted the importance of a positive workplace climate and working conditions for reducing the behaviors that can be harmful to health and productivity. Implications for theory and practice, beyond the pandemic, are discussed.
新冠疫情导致必须远程办公的员工比例大幅增加。在远程办公的背景下,带病出勤,即生病时仍坚持工作的行为,几乎未得到研究。疫情迫使数百万员工突然长时间过渡到在家工作,雇主往往因此对员工的健康状况或工作能力一无所知。这种变化还侵蚀了工作体验本身、工作场所,以及它们对个人健康和工作成果的保护作用。本研究聚焦于心理社会安全氛围(PSC)、工作场所条件的先导指标、心理需求、工作质量指标以及远程工作者代表性样本中的带病出勤之间的纵向关系。预计PSC会通过心理需求作为中介对带病出勤产生间接影响。我们在疫情的头几个月(T1:2020年4月,T2:6月,T3:12月)通过三轮在线调查从远程工作者的代表性样本中收集数据(n = 275)。我们测试了一个以心理需求为中介的PSC作为远程工作者带病出勤决定因素的模型。估计了一个交叉滞后面板模型来测试横截面和纵向关系。正如预期的那样,心理需求随时间增加。与预期相反,带病出勤的患病率保持不变,而PSC随时间增加。数据充分支持了心理需求的中介作用,即T1时对PSC的更高评价导致T2时心理需求降低,进而导致T3时带病出勤减少。我们还发现了一种相互关系,即T2时更高的心理需求导致T3时对PSC的评价降低。这些结果表明,远程工作者对其组织高度重视他们心理健康的认知是他们工作体验的一个重要决定因素,最终影响他们生病时是否工作的决定。疫情背景凸显了积极的工作场所氛围和工作条件对于减少可能危害健康和生产力行为的重要性。讨论了疫情之外对理论和实践的启示。