Psychosocial and ergonomic survey of office and field jobs in a utility company

Abstract

Introduction. The effect of different kinds of work on the psychosocial assessment of workers under the same management and organizational environment is investigated. Methods. A voluntary assessment in a utility company was carried out using the short version of the Copenhagen psychosocial questionnaire (CoPsoQ) on two occasions, 1.5 years apart. Initially, 25 office workers (11 men and 14 women) participated, while 14 of those workers (8 women and 6 men) participated in the second assessment together with 32 field workers. The sewage, water treatment and maintenance workers, totaling 32 men, also participated in a field ergonomics assessment using the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries field work ergonomic checklist. Results. The longitudinal outlook was fairly stable, with sustained severe scores in many CoPsoQ subscales and intensification of severity of workers’ control over work and esteem for men. A significantly higher esteem score resulted for field rather than office workers. Workers subjected to foul odors showed similar severity of psychosocial factors. Discussion. For most psychosocial dimensions, the organizational design and management system in place, as well as the overall cultural environment in which it operates, create a much stronger and more decisive impact than job-specific factors.

Keywords:

• administrative work
• blue-collar workers
• macroergonomics
• musculoskeletal complaints

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to express their gratitude to all participants in the study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Denis A. Coelho http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9759-9133

Carla S. D. Tavares http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0075-6145

Tânia M. Lima http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7540-3854

Miguel L. Lourenço http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5028-1205

Additional information

Funding

The current study was funded in part by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia [project UID/EMS/00151/2013 C-MAST].