The Center for Work, Health, & Well-being, a NIOSH Total Worker Health® Center of Excellence, identifies and promotes workplace policies, programs, and practices that support working conditions influencing the safety, health, and well-being of workers. | |
Center for Work, Health, & Well-being Newsletter September 2022 | |
From Center Investigator Erika Sabbath | |
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We are happy to share this issue of our Center’s newsletter. Our researchers are working on several studies that have a focus on social and health disparities, to generate evidence-based findings to advance policies and best practices. The Center's research projects seek to identify contributors to work-related well-being and mental health indicators, as part of the overall goal of improving working conditions. This issue of our newsletter highlights the Boston Hospital Workers Health Study, which I lead, and the Thriving Workers, Thriving Workplaces Study, led by Susan Peters and Greg Wagner. ~Erika
| We are excited to be kicking off a new round of data collection as part of the Boston Hospital Workers Health Study, a 15-year collaborative research project with Mass General Brigham. Building upon the research findings thus far, policies and practices have been improved, addressing working conditions for nurses and nursing assistants. We’ve now expanded the sample to include low-wage workers in food service, environmental services, and patient transport. Results from our qualitative interviews, worker surveys, and administrative data will help us understand the ways that workplace policies, practices, and working conditions may contribute to health disparities within the workforce. We will also test whether changes in organizational policies and practices benefit all workers equally, or whether these policies affect the health of some workers more than others. Study results will point us towards opportunities to reduce identified within-workforce disparities. Dr. Dean Hashimoto, the Chief Medical Officer, Occupational Health Services at Mass General Brigham, considers the Boston Hospital Workers Health Study research to be instrumental in advising employee health initiatives at their two flagship hospitals. He adds that "identifying ways that working conditions and programs can affect workers differently depending on their race or job type has spurred our current focus on the health and well-being of low-wage workers and workers of color." | |
The Center’s Thriving Workers, Thriving Workplaces Study is underway, using the recently developed Thriving from Work Questionnaire. The questionnaire has been translated into six languages and has three versions: an assessment tool, a long-form 30 item version with six dimensions of worker well-being, and a short-form 8 item version. The research team will utilize the Thriving from Work Questionnaire with workers in the construction, healthcare, and warehouse industries – people who tend to be exposed to hazards in their work environment and organization that influence their health and well-being. The study seeks to identify how working conditions (such as supervisor support, safety climate, or scheduling) and worker characteristics (race and ethnicity, age, gender, and occupation) are associated with workers’ thriving across sectors. Please contact Dr. Peters for information about using the questionnaire in your organization or research study.
We look forward to providing updates on our studies and other work to advance Total Worker Health research, disseminate our findings, translate our research into evidence-based practice, and identify organizational and public policy implications of our work. We wish everyone a safe and happy Labor Day weekend.
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3rd International Symposium to Advance Total Worker Health®
October 11-14, 2022 in Bethesda, MD and Online
Many of the researchers from the Harvard Center for Work, Health, & Well-being will be participating in the 3rd International Symposium to Advance Total Worker Health. Please find us at the Symposium or follow-up with us after the event. On Thursday October 13, Erika Sabbath will be leading a discussion featuring Karina Nielsen, Leslie Hammer, and Chris Cunningham on Work Organization as a Core Dimension of Total Worker Health: Toward an Expert Consensus; Susan Peters will be presenting Development of the Thriving from Work Questionnaire: A Measure of Work-Related Well-being; and Jack Dennerlein will be presenting Mental Health of Construction Workers. On Friday October 14, Glorian Sorensen, Jack Dennerlein, Susan Peters, and Meg Lovejoy are featured in a keynote session discussion of Approaches and Challenges to Improving Conditions of Work across Industries; Glorian Sorensen, Susan Peters and Nico Pronk will join Arif Jetha of the Institute of Worker Health to present on Protecting Workers in the Post-Pandemic World; and Lisa Burke will join the Directors of Outreach from other Total Worker Health Centers as part of a panel discussion, Accelerating Research to Practice: Connect with NIOSH Total Worker Health Centers.
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From the Boston Hospital Workers Health Study:
Job and family demands and burnout among healthcare workers: The moderating role of workplace flexibility
Maglalang DD; Sorensen G; Hopcia K; Hashimoto DM; Katigbak C; Pandey S; Takeuchi D; Sabbath EL. SSM Population Health 2021; 14. doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmph.2021.100802
Among US healthcare workers, burnout continues to be a critical issue, the predictors of which include the compounding effects of job and family demands. Using survey data collected among Nurses and Patient Care Associates in 2018 as part of the Boston Hospital Workers Health Study, the research team assessed the relationship of job and family demands, workplace flexibility, and burnout. Results of the study demonstrate that workplace flexibility is associated with reduced odds of experiencing burnout and thus plays a critical role in potentially reducing odds of burnout in the healthcare worker population.
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From the Thriving Workers, Thriving Workplaces Study:
Thriving from Work: Conceptualization and Measurement
Peters SE; Sorensen G; Gundersen DA; Katz JN; Wagner GR. Int J Environ Res Public Health 2021; 18(13): 7196. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18137196
Work is a major contributor to our health and well-being. Workers’ thriving is directly influenced by their job design, work environment and organization. This paper describes the qualitative methods used to develop a novel measure of Thriving from Work through a multi-step iterative process. Through this process, the authors defined Thriving from Work as the state of positive mental, physical, and social functioning in which workers’ experiences of their work and working conditions enable them to thrive in their overall lives, contributing to their ability to achieve their full potential in their work, home, and community.
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From a Center Affiliated Project:
How the Senior Community Service Employment Program Influences Participant Well-Being: A Participatory Research Approach With Program Recommendations
Halvorsen CJ, Werner K, McColloch E, Yulikova O. Research on Aging. June 2022. doi:10.1177/01640275221098613
This study highlights the benefits and potential of the Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP), a program that has been in existence since 1965 and that helps nearly 70,000 older job seekers each year. Based on discussions with SCSEP participants and case managers about their experiences and perceptions of the program, the researchers identified several pathways for how SCSEP influences the financial, physical, mental, and social well-being of participants. They also described recommendations to strengthen the programs that were offered by the study's participants. These findings highlight the benefits and potential of this long-running program.
From a Center Affiliated Project:
Working conditions, worker health and wellbeing, and turnover of residential addiction treatment providers in Massachusetts.
Stelson E, Sabbath-Clayton LL., Sorensen G, & Sabbath EL. (2022). Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Center for Work, Health & Well-being.
https://centerforworkhealth.sph.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/SUP_wellbeing_study_report.pdf
The emotional and physical health toll of working in addiction treatment may contribute to workforce attrition and shortages. This community-initiated qualitative study aimed to identify factors that affect organizational, provider, and client health and well-being as well as the pathways linking these constructs to develop a conceptual model. While not directly funded by the Center’s NIOSH Total Worker Health grant, this project is the result of a March 2020 Center “Works in Progress” meeting, the topic of which was the working conditions of those who provide care in residential addiction treatment facilities. Funding for this study came from NIOSH and the NIH National Cancer Institute.
More Center Publications
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Congratulations to Susan Peters, PhD, BoccThy(Hons), for receiving a Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Research Scientist Association Award. This award recognizes Susan's accomplishments and supports the dissemination of her work related to the development and validation of the Thriving from Work Questionnaire.
The Center is pleased to be hosting four visiting researchers in 2022:
Adam Chati, PhD recently finished his visit to the Center on a Fulbright Scholarship. He is a Professor of Human Management and Organizational Behavior, and Faculty of Law, Economics and Social Sciences at Hassan II University of Casablanca in Morocco. His areas of interest include well-being and remote work, including operating technology to teach and being one's own IT person when working remotely. The aim of Adam’s research is to study the impact of online teaching models that emerged during the Covid-19 pandemic in Morocco and the US.
Siw Tone Innstrand, PhD is working with our Center as part of her Fulbright Scholarship. She is a professor in occupational health psychology in the Department of Psychology and Director of the Center for Health Promotion Research at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. Siw's research interests include occupational health, health promotion, work-family balance, work engagement and burnout, interventions, and implementation research. She is one of the leaders in Norway of the EU project H-work - Multilevel Interventions to Promote Mental Health in SMEs and Public Workplaces; Center Director Glorian Sorensen serves on their board.
Emma Cedstrand is a licensed psychologist and PhD student at the Institute of Environmental Medicine at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden. She will be at the Center as she finishes her thesis. Emma’s primary interest is the psychosocial work environment's effect on health and how organizations can work to reduce psychosocial hazards and help employees thrive at work. She is especially interested in questions on intervention development, implementation design, and evaluation. In addition, Emma and her research group are hopeful that her visit will help build a foundation for potential collaboration with our Center.
Ann Sophie Lauterbach, M.Sc. is a second year PhD student at the Graduate School for Behavioral and Social Sciences, Future of Work Lab, at the University of Konstanz in Germany. She studied public administration and organizational psychology in the Netherlands, Ireland, France, Switzerland, Germany, and Canada. In her dissertation, she explores employee well-being pre and post work environment transitions. Her current research includes exploration of innovative office design and its effects on employee well-being and gender differences in absenteeism and presenteeism in remote work settings.
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The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Center for Work, Health, & Well-being
The Center for Work, Health, & Well-being is one of ten Centers of Excellence funded by the NIOSH Total Worker Health Program. The Center is comprised of partnerships and collaborations with academic and healthcare institutions: Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; Northeastern University Bouvé College of Health Sciences; Boston College School of Social Work; MIT Sloan School of Management; Mass General Brigham; Boston University School of Public Health; and HealthPartners/HealthPartners Institute in Minnesota.
Website: centerforworkhealth.sph.harvard.edu
LinkedIn: Center for Work, Health, and Well-being
Twitter: @HSPHCenterWork
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Total Worker Health® is a registered trademark of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Participation by the Center for Work, Health, & Well-being does not imply endorsement by HHS, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
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