ترس، پذیرش روانی، نیازهای شغل و تعامل کار کارمند: مدل مدیتیشن مدیریت شده یکپارچه

The revised Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory (RST) was used to examine the association between individual differences in FFFS-fear (threat detection/avoidance) and BIS-anxiety (conflict detection/cautious approach), psychological acceptance and job demands on work engagement. Moderated mediation analysis was used to test a model assessing the indirect path between BIS-anxiety/FFFS-fear and work engagement via psychological acceptance across high and low demanding jobs. Using a sample of 228 casual, part-time and full-time workers we found that FFFS-fear, rather than BIS-anxiety, predicted lower psychological acceptance which, in turn, was associated with lower work engagement; this indirect effect was only evident when the job was considered demanding. These results suggest that interventions for improving work engagement may be enhanced by targeting psychological acceptance, particularly in highly demanding jobs.

An increasingly important concept in organisational psychology is work engagement. Work engagement is conceptualised as a work-related positive state of mind consisting of vigour, dedication and absorption (Schaufeli, Bakker, & Salanova, 2006). High work engagement is negatively correlated to job burnout and predicts better job performance, customer satisfaction and financial returns of a company (e.g., Schaufeli et al., 2008 and Xanthopoulou et al., 2009). Given the importance of high work engagement to employees and their employers, research investigating factors that can enhance work engagement is vital. In this study, we continue an avenue of research using Gray’s Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory (RST; Gray & McNaughton, 2000) to examine the relationships between individual differences, situational factors and work engagement.

Work engagement represents positive employee mental health and predicts employee performance, customer satisfaction and financial performance (Bakker, Schaufelib, Leiterc, & Tarisd, 2008). This study provided an integrative model of work engagement with factors from both personality and the situation shown to be important. This study found that high fear (FFFS) led to lower psychological acceptance which led to lower work engagement, but only in jobs that were high in demands. This finding suggests that further work exploring the differential effects of dispositions towards fear and anxiety in organisational settings may be fruitful, particularly in uncovering the specific processes linking fearfulness/anxiety and poor outcomes. This finding can also lead to interventions to improve work engagement by targeting psychological acceptance and also indicates the types of jobs, such as those high in demands, where these interventions will be most effective.