The Vantage 2000 column seeks to provide a forum for discussing the latest in practice, research, and theory especially in relation to emerging views and characteristics of workforces and workplaces. The informative value of the column depends heavily upon your knowledge, experience, and intuition. You can personally help by sending me a note—be it your vision of the future, a problem you are trying to solve, research you are conducting, a consulting tip, something you’d like to hear about, or the name of a person or organization you recommend that I contact. You can also send newspaper clippings, references to a great article or book you read, or areas of emerging controversy (for your organization or for theory). Further, I am seeking organizations or academic departments to profile that provide examples of innovation in philosophy, research, development, application, or implementation aimed at meeting the demands of contemporary and emerging environments. I am eager to receive your ideas and submissions. You may reach me at any of the following: Graduate School of Management, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland 4072, Australia; Phone: +61 7 3365-6747; FAX: +61 7 3365-6988; INTERNET: c.hartel@gsm.uq.edu.au

This issue’s Vantage 2000 column features highlights from some of the in-press research of Dr. Phil Bohle, an internationally recognized expert in shiftwork. For full copies of the work or queries related to it, please contact Phil directly at any of the following: Graduate School of Management, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, 4072 Australia, Phone: +61 (7) 3365-6676, Fax: +61 (7) 3365-6988, e-mail: p.bohle @gsm.uq.edu.au

My thanks to Phil for his contributions which follow.

Since the fledgling days of work psychology, work scheduling has held a prominent position in organisational research and practice. A primary concern of current shiftwork researchers is the role of context, the role of personal characteristics, and the interplay between the two. The individual and situational variables most often examined are demographic variables, personality and behavioral factors, health status, work/nonwork conflict, roster characteristics, and perceptions of the work environment.

A few examples demonstrate the practical and often, unintuitive, findings produced by shiftwork research. For example, Wedderburn (1967) found that 31–40-year-olds had the greatest levels of satisfaction with shiftwork while very low satisfaction was evident in the under-21 and over-50 age groups. Phil’s work showed that support from supervisors and family affects "indices of adaptation to shiftwork including mood and psychological well-being" (Bohle & Tilley, 1989, 1993). Phil summarizes other work by Wedderburn (1978) that discovered different perceptions for morning, afternoon, and night shifts:

Morning shifts were most frequently characterized as being over quickly and providing more spare time, and rarely reported to restrict sexual or social activities, waste the day, or promote indigestion. Afternoon shifts were most frequently characterized as being bad for family life, providing less spare time, and demanding less responsibility, but rarely associated with disturbed sleep, tiredness, indigestion, irritability, restricted sexual activity, and starting too early. Night shift was most frequently characterized as being tiring, having drowsy moments, being bad for family life, and not starting too early. These results indicate that each shift had a relatively distinctive cluster of characteristics that could be used to distinguish it from other shifts.

Shiftwork is a significant occupational stressor that can have marked negative effects on health and well-being (Bohle & Tilley, 1989). Individual differences have been argued to play an important role in mediating the negative effects of shiftwork. In particular, hardiness has been put forward as "a constellation of personality characteristics that function as a resistance resource in the encounter with stressful life events" (Kobasa, Maddi, & Kahn, 1982, p. 169). Kobasa argued that hardiness buffers the negative effects of stressors by influencing appraisal of stressful events and subsequent coping responses (Kobasa, 1979; Kobasa et al., 1982).

In a recent longitudinal field study (Bohle, in press), Phil examined whether the dimensions of hardiness (commitment, control, and challenge) predicted psychological symptoms and dissatisfaction with shiftwork, and whether the relationships identified were confounded with neuroticism and extraversion. Measures of hardiness, neuroticism, extraversion, and symptoms were taken before nurses began shiftwork, after 6 months of shiftwork, and again after 15 months of shiftwork. The results indicate that hardiness is generally a poor predictor of shiftworkers’ psychological symptoms and dissatisfaction with working shifts. The three hardiness dimensions all failed to predict dissatisfaction, and to buffer the negative effect of night-work on symptoms. Instead of buffering effects, hardiness has main effects on health that are strongly confounded with neuroticism.

In conclusion, this study does not support the proposition that the three hardiness dimensions provide special resources for resisting the stress associated with rapid-rotation shiftwork, and specifically 3-shift schedules with night-work. Even the commitment dimension appears to have little potential to predict shiftwork tolerance, although shiftwork-specific behavioral measures could possibly be more effective. More broadly, the results are consistent with other evidence that general personality characteristics measured before entry into shiftwork are poor predictors of subsequent shiftwork tolerance within the population studied.

In a recent longitudinal study with colleague Andrew Tilley (Bohle & Tilley, in press), Phil examined nurses’ attitudes toward irregular, rapid-rotation shiftwork and predictors of overall dissatisfaction with shiftwork. Data on 186 female student nurses were collected in three stages over 15 months. In Stage 1, baselines on demographic, biological, personality, behavioral and health variables were collected. In Stage 2, or after 6 months of shiftwork, data were collected on marital status, psychological and physical symptoms, work/nonwork conflict, dissatisfaction with shiftwork, and social support from supervisors, coworkers, and family. In Stage 3, or after 15 months of shiftwork, data were collected on marital status, dissatisfaction with shiftwork, psychological and physical symptoms, and work/nonwork conflict.

The results of the longitudinal study indicate that overall dissatisfaction with shiftwork was not affected by the introduction of night work, and that perceptions of day and afternoon shifts were also unaffected. These results indicate that it is possible to substantially change a shift roster without markedly affecting overall shift satisfaction.

Specific analyses of the longitudinal data revealed that work/nonwork conflict at Stage 2 (after 6 months of shiftwork) was the most efficient predictor of dissatisfaction at Stage 2, followed by psychological symptoms at Stage 2 and social support from coworkers. Work/nonwork conflict at Stage 3 (after 15 months of shiftwork) was the most efficient predictor of dissatisfaction at Stage 3, followed by vigour and social support from family. Results also showed that night shift was more frequently reported to be lonely and less busy than day shift. Night shift received more negative ratings than day shift on nonwork activity measures ("restricts my sex life," "restricts my social life," "good for family life," "wastes the day," "provides more leisure time"). However, night shift received more positive ratings on several items relating to work organization factors; it was more frequently reported to be peaceful and less busy, and to allow greater independence, than day and afternoon shift. It was also more often reported to involve more responsibility than day shift. On the negative side, night shift was less frequently reported to be interesting than day or afternoon shift, less often reported to be over quickly than day shift, more lonely than day and afternoon shifts, more tiring and irritating than afternoon shift, and more friendly than day shift. Overall, work/nonwork conflict produced the strongest and most consistent relationships with dissatisfaction.

The shiftwork literature provides guidance on scheduling, selection of shiftworkers, and organizational cultural and management issues. For example:

The body of research shows that pre-shiftwork personality, behavioral, and biological characteristics are generally poor predictors of shiftwork tolerance, and therefore should not be used as selection criteria.

Organizational factors, such as support from supervisors and social/domestic issues, like temporal work/nonwork conflict, can have substantial effects on the health and satisfaction of shiftworkers. Therefore, management flexibility plays an important role in the consequences of shiftwork within organizations.

My goal for this column is to discuss the future of practice and research related to work and the workplace. I’d like to include perspectives from outside North America as well. To this end, I hope that, no matter where you are in the world, you will e-mail, call, write or FAX me (see contact information below) with your suggestions, views, requests and contributions (the name of an organization or academic department I can profile in a manner consistent with the goals of this column, newspaper clippings, company program pamphlets, news of research-in-progress, experience with OD and HR strategies/programs and any other information—nothing is too small). I would also be interested to hear what types of information you would like me to share with you from the Australasia region. Please send any information relevant to the points discussed in this column along with your ideas for future topics to me at: Graduate School of Management, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland 4072, Australia; Phone: +61 73365-6747; Fax: +61 7 3365-6988; Internet: C.Hartel@gsm.uq.edu.au

Bohle, P. (in press). Does "hardiness" predict adaptation to shiftwork? Work and Stress.

Bohle, P., & Tilley, A. J. (in press). Early experience of shiftwork: Influences on attitudes. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology.

Bohle, P., & Tilley, A. J. (1989). The impact of night shift on psychological well-being. Ergonomics, 32, 1089–1099.

Bohle, P., & Tilley, A. J. (1993). Predicting mood change on night shift. Ergonomics, 36, 125–133.

Kobasa, S. C. (1979). Stressful life events, personality, and health: An inquiry into hardiness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 37, 1–11.

Kobasa, S. C., Maddi, S. R., & Kahn, S. (1982). Hardiness and health: A prospective study. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 42, 168–177.

Wedderburn, A. A. I. (1967). Social factors in satisfaction with swiftly rotating shifts. Occupational Psychology, 41, 85–107.

Wedderburn, A. A. I. (1978). Some suggestions for increasing the usefulness of psychological and sociological studies of shiftwork. Ergonomics, 21, 827–833.