WHP lecture 5

What are job resources?

Work aspects that help employees achieve goals, reduce demands and costs, and stimulate growth and development.

What are personal resources?

Positive self-evaluations or beliefs about one's ability to control or influence the environment.

What are examples of job resources?

Autonomy, social support, supervisory coaching, performance feedback, and professional development opportunities.

What are examples of personal resources?

Self-efficacy, optimism, resilience, and organizational-based self-esteem.

Can a resource benefit every employee in the same way?

No. A characteristic can be a resource for one employee but not necessarily for another.

What is Conservation of Resources (COR) theory?

Hobfoll's theory proposing that people try to obtain, retain, and protect valued resources.

What causes stress according to COR theory?

The threat of resource loss, actual resource loss, or insufficient resource gain after investing resources.

What is a loss spiral in COR theory?

Resource loss can lead to further resource loss.

What is a gain spiral in COR theory?

Resource gains can lead to further resource gains.

What did Xanthopoulou et al. (2009) find about job resources, personal resources, and work engagement?

They found reciprocal relationships over time, meaning these factors can reinforce one another and engagement can help build resources.

What is autonomy at work?

Control over aspects of how, when, or where work is performed.

What can excessive autonomy lead to?

An increased decision burden or greater responsibility that can become overwhelming.

What is skill variety?

The extent to which a job requires the use of different skills and abilities.

What are potential benefits of skill variety?

Creativity, problem-solving, learning, and development.

What can excessive skill variety lead to?

Feeling chaotic or overloaded.

What are the two types of social support?

Emotional support and instrumental support.

What is emotional support?

Listening, understanding, and providing comfort.

What is instrumental support?

Providing practical help with a task or problem.

What can excessive social support cause?

An employee may feel indebted to the person providing support.

What does the principle too much of a good thing mean for job resources?

More resources are not always better because their effects depend on the amount and context.

What is recovery?

The process in which systems activated by stress return to their pre-stressor levels.

What are recovery opportunities?

Conditions that allow recovery, such as breaks, evenings, weekends, days off, vacations, and sabbaticals.

What are recovery activities?

Activities people do during leisure time, such as walking, swimming, exercise, hobbies, watching movies, and social activities.

What are recovery experiences?

Psychological experiences during activities that help people recover, including detachment, relaxation, mastery, and control.

What is psychological detachment?

Mentally switching off from work.

What is relaxation?

A state of low activation and calmness.

What is mastery as a recovery experience?

Learning or developing skills through a leisure activity.

What is control as a recovery experience?

Having the freedom to decide how to spend one's leisure time.

What is the difference between recovery opportunities, activities, and experiences?

Opportunities are the conditions for recovery, activities are what people do, and experiences are what people experience while doing them.

What are examples of recovery strategies at work?

Mental microbreaks such as listening to music, physical microbreaks such as stretching or walking, and work-related strategies such as shifting focus, goal-setting, and helping coworkers.

What did De Bloom et al. (2015) find about recovery strategies?

Physical microbreaks were most useful for health, mental microbreaks showed no improvement in health, engagement, or performance, and work-related strategies were most beneficial for engagement and performance.

What are complementary effects of recovery?

Recovery at work and recovery away from work each independently contribute to health, engagement, and performance.

What is the recovery paradox?

High job demands and limited recovery at work increase the need for recovery after work but reduce the ability or tendency to recover, creating a vicious cycle.