Are Positive Interventions Always Beneficial?

Effectiveness of a Humor-Based Training for Reducing Employees' Distress

An increasing number of studies have demonstrated that humor can impact interpersonal relationships in organizations and employee well-being. However, there is little evidence coming from intervention studies in organizational settings. In response, we developed a training following the principles of positive psychology that aims at improving employees’ adaptive use of humor as a successful mechanism to deal with stress. In this study, we assess the effectiveness of such training and its impact on employee well-being. Results from this one-group intervention study in an emergency ambulance service (N = 58) revealed that the participants reported higher levels of cheerfulness (Z = −3.93; p < 0.001) and lower levels of seriousness (Z = −3.32; p < 0.001) after being exposed to the training. Indeed, the participants reported lower scores on psychological distress after the training (Z = −3.35; p < 0.001). The effect size of the training was medium (r = 0.31 to 0.36), suggesting that interventions to improve adaptive humor at work can be a useful resource to deal with workplace stress and foster employee well-being. These results may have interesting implications for designing and implementing positive interventions as well as for developing healthy organizations.

H-WORK Project: Multilevel Interventions to Promote Mental Health in SMEs and Public Workplaces

The paper describes the study design, research questions and methods of a large, international intervention project aimed at improving employee mental health and well-being in SMEs and public organisations. The study is innovative in multiple ways. First, it goes beyond the current debate on whether individual- or organisational-level interventions are most effective in improving employee health and well-being and tests the cumulative effects of multilevel interventions, that is, interventions addressing individual, group, leader and organisational levels. Second, it tailors its interventions to address the aftermaths of the Covid-19 pandemic and develop suitable multilevel interventions for dealing with new ways of working. Third, it uses realist evaluation to explore and identify the working ingredients of and the conditions required for each level of intervention, and their outcomes. Finally, an economic evaluation will assess both the cost-effectiveness analysis and the affordability of the interventions from the employer perspective. The study integrates the training transfer and the organisational process evaluation literature to develop toolkits helping end-users to promote mental health and well-being in the workplace.