Skip to main content
NCBI home page
Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health logoLink to Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health
. 1995 Feb;49(1):48–53. doi: 10.1136/jech.49.1.48

Work characteristics and psychiatric disorder in civil servants in London.

S A Stansfeld 1, F M North 1, I White 1, M G Marmot 1
PMCID: PMC1060074  PMID: 7707005

Abstract

STUDY OBJECTIVE--To describe the association between self reported and externally assessed work characteristics and psychiatric disorder. DESIGN--Analysis of questionnaire data collected from the first phase of the Whitehall II study, a cohort study of an employed population. SETTING--Twenty civil service departments in London. PARTICIPANTS--Altogether 6900 male and 3414 female civil servants aged 35-55 years. MAIN RESULTS--High levels of subjective social support at work, control at work, job variety, and skill use were associated with greater satisfaction and wellbeing and less psychiatric disorder measured by the 30 item general health questionnaire (GHQ). High levels of subjective work pace and conflicting demands were associated with less satisfaction and wellbeing and greater psychiatric disorder. The combined effects of work characteristics were similar to the effects of the work characteristics considered separately, except that for men there was a small interaction between psychological demands and control on the GHQ. There was little overall support for the two factor job strain model. In contrast, objective indices of work were generally not associated with the psychological indices. Findings in men and women were generally comparable and were not significantly influenced by employment grade. CONCLUSIONS--Negative affectivity and a tendency to report negatively about both work and the psychological indices may partly explain the difference in the findings between subjective and objective work characteristics. However, subjective work characteristics were still associated with psychiatric disorder after adjusting for negative affectivity. The potential confounding effects of employment grade did not explain the association between either subjective or objective work characteristics and the psychological indices. While modifications to the work environment may directly reduce certain adverse physical health effects, the influence of work place design and management on psychological wellbeing, satisfaction, and psychiatric disorder may be mediated through subjective perceptions of the work environment.

Full text

PDF
48

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Brief A. P., Burke M. J., George J. M., Robinson B. S., Webster J. Should negative affectivity remain an unmeasured variable in the study of job stress? J Appl Psychol. 1988 May;73(2):193–198. doi: 10.1037/0021-9010.73.2.193. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Broadbent D. E. The clinical impact of job design. Br J Clin Psychol. 1985 Feb;24(Pt 1):33–44. doi: 10.1111/j.2044-8260.1985.tb01311.x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Chen P. Y., Spector P. E. Negative affectivity as the underlying cause of correlations between stressors and strains. J Appl Psychol. 1991 Jun;76(3):398–407. doi: 10.1037/0021-9010.76.3.398. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Frese M. Stress at work and psychosomatic complaints: a causal interpretation. J Appl Psychol. 1985 May;70(2):314–328. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Goldberg D. P., Blackwell B. Psychiatric illness in general practice. A detailed study using a new method of case identification. Br Med J. 1970 May 23;1(5707):439–443. doi: 10.1136/bmj.2.5707.439. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. Guendelman S., Silberg M. J. The health consequences of maquiladora work: women on the US-Mexican border. Am J Public Health. 1993 Jan;83(1):37–44. doi: 10.2105/ajph.83.1.37. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. Hanley J. A., McNeil B. J. A method of comparing the areas under receiver operating characteristic curves derived from the same cases. Radiology. 1983 Sep;148(3):839–843. doi: 10.1148/radiology.148.3.6878708. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. Johnson J. V., Hall E. M. Job strain, work place social support, and cardiovascular disease: a cross-sectional study of a random sample of the Swedish working population. Am J Public Health. 1988 Oct;78(10):1336–1342. doi: 10.2105/ajph.78.10.1336. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. Johnson J. V., Hall E. M., Theorell T. Combined effects of job strain and social isolation on cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality in a random sample of the Swedish male working population. Scand J Work Environ Health. 1989 Aug;15(4):271–279. doi: 10.5271/sjweh.1852. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. Kasl S. V. Mental health and work environment: an examination of the evidence. J Occup Med. 1973 Jun;15(6):509–518. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  11. Marmot M. G., Smith G. D., Stansfeld S., Patel C., North F., Head J., White I., Brunner E., Feeney A. Health inequalities among British civil servants: the Whitehall II study. Lancet. 1991 Jun 8;337(8754):1387–1393. doi: 10.1016/0140-6736(91)93068-k. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  12. Spector P. E., Dwyer D. J., Jex S. M. Relation of job stressors to affective, health, and performance outcomes: a comparison of multiple data sources. J Appl Psychol. 1988 Feb;73(1):11–19. doi: 10.1037/0021-9010.73.1.11. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  13. Stansfeld S. A., Marmot M. G. Social class and minor psychiatric disorder in British Civil Servants: a validated screening survey using the General Health Questionnaire. Psychol Med. 1992 Aug;22(3):739–749. doi: 10.1017/s0033291700038186. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health are provided here courtesy of BMJ Publishing Group

RESOURCES