Browsing by Author "Vermaak, Christel"

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    The development and empirical evaluation of a psychological well-being at work structural model for geriatric care staff
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2016-12) Vermaak, Christel; Gorgens, Gina; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Economics and Management Sciences. Dept. of Industrial Psychology.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Nursing staff constitute the largest group of employees in the healthcare industry (Giallonardo, Wong, & Iwasiw, 2010) and evidence suggests that they experience the lowest levels of job engagement and the highest levels of burnout when compared to other professional healthcare groups, including physiotherapists, child welfare workers and social rehabilitation workers (Fasoli, 2010; Nerstad, Richardsen, & Martinussen, 2010). In the light of the aforementioned it is of great importance to gain insight to those factors which may contribute to occupational health and well-being, and by implication, productivity outcomes of nursing staff (Hafner et al. 2015). The research exploring indicators of well-being in nurses tends to focus on nursing staff within hospitals, with nursing staff employed in aged care facilities (i.e. institutions specialising in the provision of care for elderly patients) receiving less attention (Rodwell, Noblet, Demir, & Steane, 2009). This is despite the trend of an aging population and the subsequent increased demand for aged care services (Kennedy, 2005). Consequently, this study attempts to develop a model that depicts a nomological network of positive psychological variables hypothesised to explain variance in the psychological well-being at work of geriatric care staff. Research on the predictors of changes in well-being incorporates job-related factors, personal resources and work-home interfaces (Sonnentag, 2015) and the legitimacy of these factors as predictors of employee well-being justifies the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model as the theoretical underpinning of this study. This study included the job demand of Illegitimate Tasks, the personal resources of Occupational Coping Self-Efficacy and Calling, as well as Job Crafting. All of these variables were hypothesised to influence the well-being of geriatric care staff either dierctly or indirectly. Boers (2014) recently developed a model focused on explicating the nomological network of variables underlying two constructs of occupational well-being, namely subjective well-being (SWB) and psychological well-being at work (PWBW). Subjective well-being was defined as hedonic well-being (HWB) and eudaimonic well-being (EWB). Hedonic well-being at work was defined as positive affect and negative affect. This study supports Boers’s (2014) conceptualisation of occupational well-being and subsequently the same constructs of well-being are included in this study. This study made use of a non-experimental research design in order to explore the relationships between the various constructs. A convenience sample of n = 206 nursing staff, employed by aged care facilities in Gauteng, completed a composite questionnaire. PWBW was assessed with the Index of psychological well-being at work (IPWBW; Dagenais-Desmarais & Savoie, 2012). HWB was measured with the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS; Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988) whilst EWB was measured with Ryff’s (1989) Psychological well-being scale (RPWB). Tims, Bakker and Derks’s (2012) Job Crafting Scale was used to measure the participants’ Job Crafting tendencies and their sense of calling was measured with the Multidimensional Calling Measure (MCM; Hagmaier & Abele, 2012). Pisanti, Lombardo, Lucidi, Lazzari and Bertini’s (2008) brief Occupational Coping Self-Efficacy Questionnaire for Nurses (OCSE-N) was used to measure the participant’s level of OCSE and lastly, the Bern Illegitimate Task Scale (BITS; Semmer, Tschan, Meier, Facchin, & Jacobshagen, 2010) was used to assess the perceived occurrence of illegitimate tasks. The validity and reliability of the measurement instruments were evaluated through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and item analysis. The structural model was fitted using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) in order to investigate to which extent the constructs successfully explained variance in PWBW. The significance of the two moderation effects was tested with moderated regression analyses. The results revealed significant relationships between various of the constructs. Both aspects of HWB, namely PA and NA were found to be significant predictors of PWBW. Calling emerged as a significant predictor of both PA and EWB and Illegitimate Tasks positively influenced NA. OCSE had a direct effect on Job Crafting and EWB. PWBW was shown to be positive related to OCSE. EWB, however, did not emerge as a significant predictor of PWBW. Support was not found for the hypothesised interaction effect of Job Crafting on the Calling and EWB relationships, or for the moderating effect of Illegitimate Tasks on the Calling and EWB relationship. This study contributed to the body of research delineating antecedents of PWBW and the practical value of the findings are condensed into managerial recommendations as well as suggestions for further studies regarding the management of PWBW of geriatric care staff. In conclusion, the results indicate that the model provides a plausible explanation of the network of variables explaining variance in PWBW of geriatric care staff.
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    Shift work, emotional labour and psychological well-being of nursing staff
    (University of Split, Faculty of Economics, 2017) Vermaak, Christel; Gorgens-Ekermans, Gina; Nieuwenhuize, Cecile
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study explored the effect of emotional labour and the psychological experience of shift work on the psychological well-being at work (PWBW) of long term care nursing staff (n = 206). The ‘psychological experience of shift work’ construct defines the perception of the negative effect that working shifts has on the employees’ daily life. Correlation and multiple regression analyses were conducted. Support was found for the negative relationships between the psychological experience of shift work and PWBW, as well as the emotional labour dimension of surface acting and PWBW. A hierarchical regression analysis suggested that, when controlling for the effect of emotional labour and certain demographic variables (including number of dependents, tenure and actual shift worked), a significant amount of unique variance in PWBW, could be accounted for by the psychological experience of shift work. These results indicate that the PWBW of nursing staff is not only influenced by which shift the individual is on (i.e. day or night shift), but more so by the individuals’ psychological experience of shift work.