Perceived social support in relation to work among Danish general dental practitioners in private practices

Team Autonomy and Organizational Support, Well-Being, and Work Engagement in the Spain Computer Consultancy Industry: The Mediating Effect of Emotional Intelligence

The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact of autonomy at work and organizations’ support for their employees on employee well-being and, ultimately, their commitment to their work, and how employees’ emotional intelligence mediates between these constructs. We distributed a 5-point Likert scale questionnaire among professionals from different companies in the IT consultancy sector in Spain. The data collected were analyzed using the PLS-SEM (partial least squares structural equation modeling) technique in the SmartPLS software. The analysis of the data collected shows that there is indeed a positive relationship between job autonomy and the organizational support received by workers and their well-being, as well as between the well-being of workers and their commitment to work. Likewise, the mediation effect of emotional intelligence between job autonomy and organizational support and the well-being of workers is also evident. We can conclude that improving the autonomy and support given by organizations to their employees would have a beneficial effect on the well-being and work engagement of employees.

Work-Related Psychosocial Stress in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises: An Integrative Review

Background: Work-related psychosocial stress can cause mental and physical illnesses resulting in high costs for the individual, the economy and society. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) employ the majority of the world’s workforce and often have fewer financial and human resources compared to larger businesses. The aim of this review is to summarize current knowledge on work-related stress in SMEs according to well-established guidelines categorizing psychosocial factors at work. Methods: A systematic database search was carried out in PubMed, PsycINFO, PSYNDEX and Business Source Premiere from March to June 2019, updated in January 2020. Data of included studies were analyzed and mapped into five themes: “work content and task”, “organization of work”, “social relations”, “working environment” and “new forms of work”. Results: After full-text screening, 45 out of 116 studies were included for data extraction. Studies were very heterogeneous and of varying quality, mostly applying a cross-sectional study design. Psychosocial factors in SMEs have been researched with a focus on the work patterns “work organization” and “work content and task”. Conclusions: This review underlines the need for more and better quality research of psychosocial factors in SMEs, particularly in relation to ongoing and new challenges in the workplace, including stressors related to the process of digitalization or the development of safe working conditions during the emerge of new infectious diseases.

Musculoskeletal disorders and emergent themes of psychosocial factors and their impact on health in dentistry

BACKGROUND

Dentistry is a profession where musculoskeletal disorders are prevalent. Physical demands and static awkward postures increase the risks of dentists developing musculoskeletal disorders. In addition, researchers have identified psychosocial factors that can influence the health of workers.

OBJECTIVE

The aim of this research is to present self-reported pain regions and to assess psychosocial work factors as they relate to dentistry.

METHOD

Fourteen dentists participated in the study. Data was collected via a questionnaire administered prior to the start of and during the study. Descriptive statistics were used for data analysis.

RESULTS

All dentists self-reported to be in good to excellent health and only 50% sought medical treatment for work-related discomfort and pain. Thirteen of 14 reported being at least occasionally mentally and physically exhausted after work. A musculoskeletal disorder-work hour relationship model was created. Feedback given was linked to four psychosocial factors -job demand, job control, social interactions, and job future and career issues.

CONCLUSIONS

The dental profession is considered a highly cognitive profession where much attention has been placed on the physical demands due to awkward postures. While physical demands are validated, additional research will further validate the link between psychosocial and mental and physical demands.

Psychosocial student functioning in comprehensive dental clinic education: A qualitative study

INTRODUCTION

The aims were to describe first-year clinical dental students' psychosocial experiences in a known well-functioning comprehensive clinic teaching group (F+Grp) and a known dysfunctional group (Dys-Grp) and, thus, discover and describe phenomena related to psychosocial functioning of students. These groups were compared and contrasted regarding negative stress symptoms, perfectionism and coping with stress.

METHODS

Eight female dental students (mean 26 years old), four in each group, were interviewed after the first clinical year about learning and emotional experiences. The students also rated their perceived stress using a 0-10 scale, where 0 is no stress, and 10 is highest stress. Qualitative analyses involved searching for recurring themes and discovery of categories of clinical and social functioning. All 8 students were revisited as dentists after 8 years and filled out a 15-item survey as longitudinal validation of their first-year clinical experiences and to estimate group consensus and informant accuracy.

RESULTS

Both groups suffered from negative stress symptoms attributed to lack of time for clinical tasks, worries about work quality with confusion about their own expectations and worries about how others perceived them. Dys-Grp experienced higher negative stress and maladaptive perfectionism and described crying behaviours, withdrawal and unwillingness to cooperate with others. In contrast, students in F+Grp provided rich content about mutual cooperation related to social networking and positive support. The 8 subjects exhibited high internal consistency (α  =  .98) in their responses to the follow-up survey about their first year of clinic.

CONCLUSIONS

The comprehensive care teaching clinic environment with students working in groups appeared to provide a possibility for students to support each other for improved stress coping. Unfortunately, the opposite also occurred. Positive, supportive teacher supervision of student challenges related to perfectionism and stress is crucial and requires specific attention.

High Job Demands, Still Engaged and Not Burned Out? The Role of Job Crafting

PURPOSE

Traditionally, employee well-being has been considered as resulting from decent working conditions arranged by the organization. Much less is known about whether employees themselves can make self-initiated changes to their work, i.e., craft their jobs, in order to stay well, even in highly demanding work situations. The aim of this study was to use the job demands-resources (JD-R model) to investigate whether job crafting buffers the negative impacts of four types of job demands (workload, emotional dissonance, work contents, and physical demands) on burnout and work engagement.

METHOD

A questionnaire study was designed to examine the buffering role of job crafting among 470 Finnish dentists.

RESULTS

All in all, 11 out of 16 possible interaction effects of job demands and job crafting on employee well-being were significant. Job crafting particularly buffered the negative effects of job demands on burnout (7/8 significant interactions) and to a somewhat lesser extent also on work engagement (4/8 significant interactions). Applying job crafting techniques appeared to be particularly effective in mitigating the negative effects of quantitative workload (4/4 significant interactions).

CONCLUSION

By demonstrating that job crafting can also buffer the negative impacts of high job demands on employee well-being, this study contributed to the JD-R model as it suggests that job crafting may even be possible under high work demands, and not only in resourceful jobs, as most previous studies have indicated. In addition to the top-down initiatives for improving employee well-being, bottom-up approaches such as job crafting may also be efficient in preventing burnout and enhancing work engagement.

With a little help from my assistant: buffering the negative effects of emotional dissonance on dentist performance

OBJECTIVE

In this study, we hypothesized that dentist' interpersonal resources (good cooperation with one's assistant) together with their personal resources (optimism) buffer the negative effects of emotional dissonance (a demand that occurs when there is a difference between felt and displayed emotions) on job performance (in-role and extra-role performance) over time.

METHOD

We carried out Hierarchical Regression Modeling on a sample of 1954 Finnish dentists who participated in a two-wave 4-year longitudinal study.

RESULTS

Results showed that good cooperation with dental assistants buffered the negative effects of emotional dissonance on both in-role and extra-role performance among the dentists in the long term. However, unexpectedly, dentists' high optimism did not buffer their in-role nor extra-role performance over time under conditions of experiencing high emotional dissonance.

CONCLUSIONS

We conclude that interpersonal job resources such as good cooperation with one's colleagues may buffer the negative effect of emotional dissonance on dentists' job performance even in the long term, whereas the role of personal resources (e.g., optimism) may be less important for maintaining high job performance under conditions of emotional dissonance. The study novelties include the test of the negative effects of emotional dissonance on long-term performance in dentistry and the identification of the job rather than personal resources as the buffers against the negative effects of emotional dissonance on long-term performance.

Collegial Support and Community with Trust in Swedish and Danish dentistry

OBJECTIVES

The aim of the study was to better understand the associations between work factors and professional support among dentists (Collegial Support) as well as the sense of being part of a work community characterized by trust (Community with Trust).

METHODS

A questionnaire was sent to 1835 general dental practitioners, randomly selected from the members of dental associations in Sweden and Denmark in 2008. The response rate was 68%. Two models with the outcome variables Collegial Support and being part of a Community with Trust were built using multiple hierarchical linear regression. Demographic background factors, work factors, managerial factors and factors relating to objectives and to values characterizing climate of the practice were all introduced as blocks into the models.

RESULTS

A different pattern emerged for Collegial Support than for Community with Trust, indicating different underlying mechanisms. The main results were: (I) Female, married/cohabitant, collegial network outside the practice, common breaks, formalized managerial education of leader and a climate characterized by professional values, which were positively associated with Collegial Support, while number of years as a dentist and being managerially responsible were negatively associated. (II) Common breaks, decision authority and a climate characterized by professional values were positively associated with Community with Trust.

CONCLUSION

A professionally-oriented practice climate and having common breaks at work were strongly associated with both outcome variables. The study underlined the importance of managing dentistry in a way which respects the professional ethos of dentists.

Measurement of social support, community and trust in dentistry

BACKGROUND AND AIM

Relationships among people at work have previously been found to contribute to the perception of having a good work. The aim of the present paper was to develop scales measuring aspects of social support, trust, and community among dentists, and to evaluate psychometric properties of the scales.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

In 2008, a questionnaire was sent to 1,835 general dental practitioners randomly selected from the dental associations in Sweden and Denmark. The response rate was 68% after two reminders. Principal Component Analysis was applied to 14 items and scales were established based on the resulting factors. Internal consistency was evaluated by Cronbach's alpha. Differential Item Functioning (DIF) with respect to gender, nationality and employment sector was analysed using ordinal logistic regression methods. Construct validity was assessed in relation to self-rated health and a range of work satisfaction outcomes.

RESULTS

The percentage of missing values on the items was low (range 0.7%-3.8%). Two scales (range 0-100) were established to measure 'Community with Trust'(nine items, mean = 79.2 [SD = 13.4], Cronbach's alpha = 0.89) and 'Collegial Support'(five items, mean = 70.4 [SD = 20.8], Cronbach's alpha = 0.89). DIF of only minor importance was found which supported cultural equivalence. The two scales were weakly positively correlated with each other. 'Community with Trust' was in general more strongly correlated with work satisfaction variables than 'Collegial Support' was.

CONCLUSIONS

Stability and internal consistency of the scales were considered as satisfactory. Content validity and construct validity were considered as good. Further validation in other populations is recommended.

Overall job satisfaction among dentists in Sweden and Denmark: A comparative study, measuring positive aspects of work

OBJECTIVE

Human service work differs from industrial work, which should be considered when organizing work. Previous research has shown organizational differences in the perceptions of work, often with a focus on negative aspects. The aim of this study was to analyse the overall job satisfaction among private- and public-practising dentists in Sweden and Denmark. This also implied a description of the questionnaire Swedish and Danish Dentists' Perceptions of Good Work about opportunities and positive and rewarding aspects of work.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

A questionnaire covering the multidimensional concept of good work was developed. A total of 1835 dentists randomly sampled from the dental associations were sent a questionnaire in November 2008. A special non-response study was performed. Principal components analysis (PCA) was used to create a measure of overall job satisfaction, comparing four organizational subgroups.

RESULTS

The average net response rate was 68% (n = 1226). The special non-response study of the Danish private practitioners showed more males, managers and dentists with more working hours than the respondents. PCA of three satisfaction questions showed a stable one-factor solution. There were differences in job satisfaction, with Danish public dentists ranked highest in overall job satisfaction and Swedish public dentists lowest.

CONCLUSIONS

There were organizational differences in the perception of job satisfaction. Further analysis of how the human service is organized in the different groups is needed.