[7] The Industrial Revolution prompted thinkers, such as Karl Marx with his theory of alienation,[8] to concern themselves with the nature of work and its impact on workers.
[1][2] For example, in the U.K. Trist and Bamforth (1951) found that the reduction in miner autonomy that accompanied organizational changes in English coal mining operations adversely affected morale.
[16] Arthur Kornhauser's work in the early 1960s on the mental health of automobile workers in Michigan[17] also contributed to the development of the field.
[18][19] A 1971 study by Gardell examined the impact of work organization on mental health in Swedish pulp and paper mill workers and engineers.
That same year, the International Commission on Occupational Health created the Work Organisation and Psychosocial Factors (ICOH-WOPS) scientific committee,[29] which focused primarily on OHP.
[40][41] OHP-related research devoted to evaluating health-promoting workplace interventions has relied on quasi-experimental designs,[42][43] (less commonly) experimental approaches, and (rarely) natural experiments.
Resources, however, are defined as job-relevant features that help workers achieve work-related goals, lessen job demands, or stimulate personal growth.
Resources can be external (provided by the organization) or internal (part of a worker's personal make-up, for example self-confidence or quantitative skills).
In addition to control and support, resources encompassed by the model can also include physical equipment, software, realistic performance feedback from supervisors, the worker's own coping strategies, etc.
[1] The person-environment (P-E) fit model is concerned with the extent to which a worker's abilities and personality dovetail with the tasks his/her job requires.
These risk factors include smoking, obesity, low density lipoprotein (the "bad" cholesterol), lack of exercise, and blood pressure.
[81] There is evidence that, consistent with the ERI model, high work-related effort coupled with low control over job-related rewards adversely affects cardiovascular health.
Examples of workplace incivility include insulting comments, denigration of the target's work, spreading false rumors, social isolation, etc.
[102][103] Although definitions of workplace bullying vary, it involves a repeated pattern of harmful behaviors directed towards an individual by one or more others who, singly or collectively, have more power than the target.
[109] Another workers' compensation study found that excessively high rates of assault-related injury in schools, healthcare, and, to a lesser extent, banking.
A prospective study of ECA subjects who were followed one year after the initial interviews provided data on newly incident cases of alcohol use disorder.
[116] The study found that workers in jobs that combined low control with high physical demands were at increased risk of developing alcohol problems although the findings were confined to men.
Evidence from a Canadian prospective study indicated that individuals in the highest quartile of occupational stress (high-strain jobs as per the demand-control model) are at increased risk of experiencing an episode of major depression.
[114] A meta-analysis that pooled the results of 11 well-designed longitudinal studies indicated that a number of facets of the psychosocial work environment (e.g., low decision latitude, high psychological workload, lack of social support at work, effort-reward imbalance, and job insecurity) increase the risk of common mental disorders such as depression.
[40] Depending on the diagnosis, severity and individual, and the job itself, personality disorders can be associated with difficulty coping with work or the workplace, potentially leading to problems with others by interfering with interpersonal relationships.
[119][120] In a case-control study, Link, Dohrenwend, and Skodol (1986) compared schizophrenic patients to two comparison groups, depressed individuals and well controls.
In another study, Frese (1985)[131] concluded that objective working conditions (e.g., noise, ambiguities, conflicts) give rise to subjective stress and psychosomatic symptoms in blue collar German workers.
[134] The impact of involuntary unemployment was comparatively weaker in countries that had greater income equality and better social safety nets.
Innovations included labor-management partnerships, suicide risk reduction, conflict mediation, and occupational mental health support.
[142] The hub of the intervention was the Stress and Wellness Committee (SWC) which solicited ideas from workers on ways to improve both their well-being and productivity.
Innovations the SWC developed included improvements that ensured two-way communication between workers and management and reduction in stress resulting from diminished conflict over issues of quantity versus quality.
For example, NIOSH research has aimed at reducing the problem of sleep apnea among heavy-truck and tractor-trailer drivers and, concomitantly, the life-threatening accidents to which the disorders lead.
[145] The Mental Health Advisory Teams of the United States Army employ OHP-related interventions with combat troops.
[148][149] Schmitt (2007) described three different modestly scaled OHP-related interventions that helped workers abstain from smoking, exercise more frequently, and lose weight.
[150] Other OHP interventions included a campaign to improve the rates of hand washing, an effort to get workers to walk more often, and a drive to get employees to be more compliant with regard to taking prescribed medicines.