Comparing Group and Individual Level Assessments of Job Characteristics in Testing the Job...

28
Comparing Group and Individual Level Assessments of Job Characteristics in Testing the Job Demand-Control Model: A Multilevel Approach Jan de Jonge, 1,4 Gerard J. P. van Breukelen, 2 Jan A. Landeweerd, 3 and Frans J. N. Nijhuis 3 This article describes a test of Karaseks Job Demand-Control (JD-C) Model using both group and individual level assessments of job characteristics. By group assessments, we mean aggregated individual data. A random sample from general hospitals and nursing homes included 16 institutions, 64 units, and 1489 health care workers (82% response). Because of the hierarchically nested data structure (i.e., institutions, units, and individuals) the research questions and hypothe sis were tested in multilevel regression analyses (VARCL). The results revealed both group level and individual level effects with regard to psychological outcomes, and stressed the usefulness of multilevel techniques. Karaseks JD-C Model was partly confirmed by finding two interaction effects at group level and at individual level with regard to job satisfaction and work motivation, respectively. The discussion focuses on theoretical, methodological, and practical implications of multilevel modeling with respect to the JD-C Model. KEY WORDS: job demand-control model; multilevel analysis; workstre ss; health care. INTRODUCTION In order to redesign jobs or workplaces, researchers were always in- terested in how job characteristics affect working people. In the last few decades, many organizational research studies have shown that the pres- Human Relations, Vol. 52, No. 1, 1999 95 0018-7267/99/0100-0095$16.00/1 Ó 1999 The Tavistock Institute 1 Department of Work and Organizational Psychology, University of Nijmegen, The Nether- lands. 2 Department of Methodology and Statistics, Maastricht University, The Netherlands. 3 Department of Health Organization, Policies and Economics, Work and Health Section, Maastricht University, The Netherlands. 4 Requests for reprints should be addressed to Jan de Jonge, Department of Work and Or- ganizational Psychology, University of Nijmegen, P.O. Box 9104, 6500 HE Nijmegen, The Netherlands.

Transcript of Comparing Group and Individual Level Assessments of Job Characteristics in Testing the Job...

Com paring Group and Individual Level

Assessments of Job Characteristics in Testing

the Job Demand-Con trol Model A Multilevel

Approach

Jan de Jonge14 Gerard J P van Breukelen 2 Jan A Landeweerd 3

an d Fran s J N Nijh u is3

This article describe s a te st of Karase krsquos Job Demand-Control (JD-C) Mode l

using both group and individual level asse ssme nts of job characteristics By group

asse ssm e nts we me an aggre gate d individual data A random sam ple from

ge neral hospitals and nursing hom es include d 16 institutions 64 units and 1489

he alth care worke rs (82 response) Be cause of the hie rarchically nested data

structure ( ie institution s units and individuals) the re search que stions and

hypothe sis were te sted in multile vel regression analyse s (VARCL) The results

revealed both group level and individual level effects with regard to psychological

outcomes and stre sse d the use fulness of multilevel techniques Karasekrsquos JD-C

Mode l was partly confirm ed by finding two interaction effects at group level and

at individual level with regard to job satisfaction and work motivation respe ctively

The discussion focuse s on theore tical methodological and practical implications

of multilevel mode ling with respect to the JD-C Mode l

KEY WORDS job demand-control model multilevel analysis workstre ss health care

INTRODUCTION

In order to redesign jobs or workplaces re searchers we re always in-

te rested in how job characteristics affe ct working pe ople In the last few

decades many organizational re search studie s have shown that the pres-

Hum an Relations Vol 52 No 1 1999

95

0018-7267990100-0095$16001 Oacute 1999 The Tavistock Institute

1Departm ent of Work and O rganizational Psychology Unive rsity of Nijmegen The Nether-

lands2Departm ent of Methodology and Statistics Maastricht University The Ne therlands3Departm ent of He alth O rganization Policies and E conomics Work and He alth Section

Maastricht University The Netherlands4Reque sts for reprints should be addre sse d to Jan de Jonge Departme nt of Work and O r-

ganizational Psychology Unive rsity of Nijmegen PO Box 9104 6500 HE Nijmegen The

Ne therlands

ence or abse nce of certain job characte ristics (e g job demands and job

autonomy) may le ad to attitudinal and behavioural reactions such as job

satisfaction e xhaustion he alth complaints and e ven illness or disability

( e g Hackman amp O ldham 1980 Karasek amp The ore ll 1990 Schnall

Landsbergis amp Baker 1994 Siegrist Pe ter Junge Cre mer amp Seide l 1990

Warr 1987) As a consequence several the oretical models have been de-

ve loped to understand the relationship betwe en such job characte ristics and

employee reactions (cf Kahn amp Byosiere 1992) In ge neral these models

can be described as situation-centered or person-centered (cf Warr 1987)

Situation-centered mode ls focus primarily on e xplanatory factors or e vents

outside a particular worker while person-centered mode ls see k explana-

tions in the person whose actions are be ing studie d (e g cognitions habits

fee lings and nee ds)

A situation-centered mode l on which much of the current job rede sign

research and job stress research is based is the Job De mand-Control (JD-C)

Model deve loped by Karase k (1979) In its basic form the model postulates

that the primary sources of job stress lie within two basic characteristics of

the job itself (1) psychological job demands and (2) job decision latitude

Job demands are defined as psychological stressors that are present in the

work e nvironment (eg workload) Job de cision latitude or job control is

defined as ldquothe working individualrsquos potential control over his tasks and his

conduct during the working dayrdquo (Karasek 1979 pp 289-290)

Psychological strains are a consequence of the joint effects of the de-

mands of a job and the range of job control available to the employee The se

joint e ffects are also called interaction effects The first major prediction of

the JD -C Model is that the strongest ave rsive job-related strain reactions

( like e xhaustion job-relate d anxie ty and health complaints) will occur when

job de mands are high and workerrsquos control is low (ie high strain jobs) The

second prediction of the model which is some time s overlooked is that mo-

tivation le arning and personal growth will occur in situations where both job

demands and workerrsquos control are high (ie active jobs)

Te sts of the JD -C Model can be roughly divided into two cate gorie s

name ly (1) multi-occupation studies and (2) single -occupation studie s (cf

De Jonge 1995 Jones amp Fle tcher 1996) The forme r kind of studies are

usually large -scale e xaminations of national surveys that mainly focus on

cardiovascular disease s These studies freque ntly use an occupation le ve l

of analysis The latte r refers to individual le ve l self-report studie s that focus

on attitudinal outcome s (e g job satisfaction and work motivation) behav-

ioural outcome s (e g abse ntee ism and smoking consumption) and physi-

ological outcome s ( e g blood pre ssure and muscle te nsion) A large

number of studies evaluating the JD-C Model faile d to provide clear and

unam biguous support (De Jonge amp Kompie r 1997 Jone s amp Fle tche r

96 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

1996) Several conceptual as we ll as methodological criticisms have been

expre ssed in the lite rature that might e xplain the inconclusive re sults First

the re is some doubt as to the conceptualization and operationalization of

job demands and job decision latitude particularly in the multi-occupation

studies Job demands as used by Karasek seem to be a mixture of job stres-

sors job complexity and lack of control (Jones amp Fletcher 1996 Kasl

1996) For instance ldquohectic workrdquo may have different meanings depending

on the particular job of the re spondent In addition to this the original

scale of Karasek (1979 1985) includes not only purely descriptive items

but also affe ctive items which may le ad to spurious re lationships with the

depe nde nt variable s (cf Wall Jackson Mullarkey amp Parker 1996) Job

decision latitude reflects the term ldquojob autonomyrdquo as it is used in the job

redesign tradition but the operationalization of this construct also contains

eleme nts like skill leve l skill varie ty and e ven job scope or job comple xity

(Frese 1989 Ganster 1989 1995 Kasl 1996) So the me asurement of

both job demands and job decision latitude may be confused with other

job characte ristics

Second in multi-occupation studie s re sults may be confounded with

for instance socioeconomic status and health behaviour of the workers

Jobs concomitantly high in demands and low in control are likely ove r-

represented by e mployee s of low socioeconomic class and low health be-

haviour who share other risks for cardiovascular diseases (e g Sie grist e t

al 1990) Third the finding of significant inte raction e ffects of job de-

mands and job decision latitude may be affe cted by the use of different

me thods andor diffe re nt kinds of inte raction te rms (e g Kasl 1996

Landsbergis Schnall Warre n Pickering amp Schwartz 1994) More specifi-

cally both analysis of variance and regression analysis have been carried

out In general the first me thod produces re sults that are re lative ly often

in favor of the JD -C Model However it has been argue d that inte ractions

ideally should be tested with moderated regression analysis (Aiken amp West

1991 Landsbergis e t al 1994) Q uite often studies that use the latter do

not yie ld positive re sults (e g Payne amp Fle tche r 1983 Spe ctor 1987)

These differences in re sults can be e xplained by powe r differences betwe en

different statistical me thods Fourth it is also possible that the inconsis-

tentmdashinte ractivemdashfindings could be due to one or more moderator vari-

ables influe ncing re lations betwe e n job characte ristics and outcomes (eg

personality characte ristics or workplace social support) A number of re-

search studies have started in order to investigate these moderating e ffects

some of them with quite promising re sults (see Johnson 1989 Jones amp

Fletcher 1996 Parkes 1991 De Rijk Le Blanc Schaufeli amp De Jonge

1998)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 97

Finally an alternative explanation for the lack of consistency may be

the assessme nt of job characte ristics Basically the JD-C Model is situ-

ation-centered in that it emphasize s the particular role of the work envi-

ronme nt in the prediction of job-related strain It is self-evide nt that in

case s whe re the aim is to rede sign work indepe nde ntly of a particular

worker one nee ds more objective parame ters which are able to show to

have an impact on peoplersquos behaviour (Frese amp Z apf 1994) In other words

job de mands and job control are in the ory characteristics of jobs rather

than characte ristics of people

Job de mands and job control ge nerally have bee n measured by means

of se lf-report que stionnaires Howeve r the main problem with such ques-

tionnaire instrume nts is thatmdashas re flections of the objective work e nviron-

mentmdashthey are more prone to bias than objective instruments Se lf-report

que stionnaires me asure job characte ristics as perceive d by the individual

worker and may the re fore not reflect the objective task accurate ly (Karase k

amp Theore ll 1990) For instance someone can work in a job with high de-

mands and not report feelings of high workload

Consequently the me thodology of the JD -C studies (the multi-occu-

pation studie s in particular) has varied considerably Most studies re ly heav-

ily on the individualrsquos perception or description of job characte ristics (cf

Soumlde rfeldt Soumlderfeldt Jones O rsquoCampo Muntaner O hlson amp Warg 1996)

A few have highlighted the grouprsquos perception or description as a re flection

of the objective environment (cf De Jonge amp Kompier 1997 Schnall e t

al 1994) This point will be discussed in more detail in the next section

THE ASSESSMENT OF JOB CHARACTE RISTICS

The job characteristics of the JD-C Model have bee n measured in two

different ways (1) ldquoobjective rdquo and (2) ldquosubjectiverdquo (Karase k amp Theorell

1990 Kristensen 1995) ldquoO bjectiverdquo and ldquosubjectiverdquo have been put in quo-

tation marks because they are used inconsistently in the literature on work-

stress So-calle d ldquoobjective rdquo job characte ristics may be de fine d as ones

which are assessed independently of the job incumbent (cf Fre se amp Zapf

1988 1994 Spe ctor 1992) Examples are physical and social characteristics

of the work e nvironment or expe rt ratings Accordingly ldquosubjectiverdquo job

characte ristics are de pendent on employe ersquos cognitive and e motional proc-

essing (like appraisals) and the ir ability in coping (Fre se amp Zapf 1988

1994 Lazarus 1995)

Currently the objective method is carried out through (1) direct in-

depe nde nt me asurement and (2) observe rsrsquo ratings (e g Frese amp Zapf

1988 Kristensen 1995 Schnall e t al 1994 Theorell amp Karasek 1996)

The main problem with direct measurement of objective characteristics is

98 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

that some aspe cts are difficult to e xpress in concre te physical te rms (Warr

1987) For e xample job autonomy and job clarity do not provide usable

ge neral marke rs The second approach seems to be objective as me ntioned

above but may be influenced by observersrsquo bias The measurement yie lds

incomple te and partially invalid information due to limited observation

time or space and the e ffects of the observation itse lf (Fre se amp Z apf 1988)

Additionally obse rve rsrsquo ratings see m to suffer from stronge r halo and

stereotyping effects than subjectsrsquo assessments (Frese 1985 Semmer Zapf

amp Gre if 1996 Spector Brannick amp Coove rt 1989)

The subjective method is usually carried out by means of se lf-report

questionnaire s This kind of me asureme nt has several problems as we ll

(e g Frese 1985 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1989 1996 Spector 1992

Zapf 1989) such as (1) conceptual overlap betwe en indepe ndent and de-

pendent me asures in that both me asures reflect the same construct (2)

common me thod variance because the information is derive d from the

same source (eg central tendency acquiescence) (3) influence of a third

variable that causes a spurious re lationship (eg a pe rsonal trait) (4) the

potential influencemdashor alterationmdashof the e stimation of job characteristics

due to the presence of an outcome variable (e g health complaints) (5)

possible e ffect of demand characte ristics of the re search context and e x-

perimenter e ffects re sulting in false correlations betwe en job characteristics

and outcome variable s (6) job incumbents may be so used to the ir work

situation that they deny some of the occupational hazards

Spector (1992) argued that more work nee ds to be done e xploring the

accuracy of reports both from the perspective of the job incumbent and

from alte rnative sources to reflect the work conditions O ne way to avoid

the above -me ntioned problems as far as possible is to look for such alte r-

native sources So-calle d group assessm ents seem to be ve ry useful in meas-

uring job characte ristics (Frese 1985 1989 Fre se amp Zapf 1988 Spector

1992) By group assessments we mean that the scores of job incumbents

with the same job and working in ne arly identical workplaces are aggre -

gate d into one ge neral score The group assessments can be described as

the group e stimate s of the re spective job characte ristic for each job incum-

bent These me asures re fe r to that part of a particular job characteristic

that different workers doing ne arly the same job have in common (see also

Semme r e t al 1996) In other words group asse ssments are base d on the

concept of the ideal typical worker ( ie an ave rage worker with sufficient

skills to perform his or he r tasks) According to Fre se and Zapf (1988

1994) group assessments are more objective measures in the sense that

the influence of idiosyncraticmdashindividualmdashperceptions and possibly illusory

answers are reduced In addition to this the e xpertise of workers is taken

into account and problems of brie f pe riods of observation are avoide d Fi-

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 99

nally group assessments see m to be less subject to methodological prob-

le ms such as attenuation because unsystematic error variance is reduced

Thus group data are likely to be more reliable than individual assessme nts

Theoretical justification for considering group assessments as more ob-

je ctive me asures of the two job characte ristics in the JD-C Model can be

found in the literature on social and inte ractional psychology industrial

and organizational psychology and organizational behaviour and e cology

(eg Alderfer 1987 Baron amp Boudreau 1987 Gibson 1979 Hackman

1976 Kraheacute 1992 Schneide r 1987 Warr 1987) From the point of view

of modern interactionism for instance there e xists situational features that

can be consensually regarde d as part of the situation These features are

conceptualized as situational ldquoaffordance srdquo and are constructs that imply

the complimentarity of both work e nvironments and workers What makes

the features ldquoquasi-objectiverdquo is the fact that they be long to the work situ-

ation irrespective of whe the r or not the job incumbent recognizes them as

such For e xample a danger signal te lls a majority of workers to run to

the e me rge ncy e xit Affordance s have some conce ptual similarity with

Hackman rsquos (1976) ldquogroup-supplied stimulirdquoAnother justification is provide d by Schne ide rrsquos (1987) ASA frame-

work This framework sugge sts that employe es will expe rience similar work-

ing conditions due to attraction se lection and attrition processes in an

organization This re sults in similarity in behaviour within a work se tting

In othe r words the pe ople make the workplace (Schneide r 1987) Al-

though Schneider bases his framework primarily at the organizational leve l

it is most likely that his ideas can be e mployed at the group le ve l of analysis

The claim that group assessment ( ie aggre gated data) is more ob-

je ctive is corroborate d by se ve ral e mpirical findings For instance a

me taanalysis of 16 conve rge nce studie s conducte d by Spe ctor (1992)

showe d that aggre gate -leve l corre lations betwee n job characte ristics and

outcome s were similar to individual le ve l correlations Moreover it ap-

peared that the converge nt validity at the aggre gate d le ve l was rather large

and e ven large r than at the individual leve l

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to test the JD-C Model using both group

and individual indicators of job characteristics The reason why we used

group and individual assessments of job demands and job autonomy is that

we want to find out whether aggre gated job characte ristics data significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics data with regard to

employee he alth In othe r words the key question is whether aggre gated

job characteristics e xplain additional variance in individualsrsquo attitudinal re-

100 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

actions This could mean that some of the explained variance of employe e

health is attributable to some more objective features outside the individual

pe rce ption or asse ssme nt (e g affordance s or group-supplie d stimuli)

which has important theoretical and practical conseque nces For instance

if job-relate d strain captures group le ve l variance the aspirations of the

JD -C Model to be situation-centered would rece ive support In addition

to all this we tried to measure the two job characte ristics (job demands

and job autonomy) more precise ly and e xte nsive ly Lastly the inte raction

effect of demands and autonomy was tested with regre ssion techniques in-

cluding a multiplicative interaction term (cf Aiken amp West 1991 Jaccard

Turrisi amp Wan 1990 Landsbergis et al 1994)

We tested the JD-C Model in a single -occupation sample of health care

workers because the ir professions are ve ry suitable for testing the JD-C

Model for several reasons (e g Fox Dwye r amp Ganster 1993 Ganster amp

Fusilier 1989) First health care workers seem to be subject to stressful work

conditions (ie high job demands) Second job autonomy is an important

tool in present-day care de livery systems Third because of different types of

health care areas and different specialties he alth care workers are a re lative ly

hete rogeneous group Moreover Ganster and Fusilie r (1989) showed that

there is as much variability in health care sample s as there is across a fairly

wide range of occupations Finally the relative homogeneity in social class

restricts the confounding e ffect of socioeconomic status

In line with the JD-C Model it is hypothesized that job demands and

job autonomy have an interaction effect with respect to e mployee he alth

To be more specific we e xpe ct that job autonomy attenuates the adve rse

effects of job demands on employe e health In addition to this we will

compare aggre gated and individual data by means of the variance to be

explaine d We e xpect that give n that aggre gated data correspond to the

more objective work conditions then if the JD-C Model is correct the

use of aggre gated data should reve al stronger interaction e ffects

METHOD

Sam ple

A random sample of 16 institutions was drawn from all gene ral hos-

pitals and nursing home s in the Netherlands (N = 218) Eight general hos-

pitals and e ight nursing home s participated in the study He alth care

workers in four units in each institute we re asked to comple te a que stion-

naire Six types of units were present in the sample an intensive care unit

(ICU) a psychiatric unit an inte rnal unit a surgical unit a somatic unit

and finally a psychogeriatric unit The initial sample consisted of 1806

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 101

health care workers from 64 units including nurses nursesrsquo aide s student

nurses activity therapists secretarie s and kitchen staff Self-report ques-

tionnaire s were fille d in and 1489 responde nts returne d the completed

que stionnaire by post (82 response ) In order to keep the work situation

roughly constant across individuals within a give n unit we only included

health care workers with the same job leve l name ly registe red nurses (cf

Thomas 1986) Furthermore only workers who had bee n e mployed for

more than 3 months we re included in the final sample in order to e nsure

valid and reliable observations of the work situation (cf Frese amp Zapf

1994 Katz 1978) These two restrictions reduce the sample to 895 regis-

te red nurses E ighty-four percent of the re spondents were wome n and the

age ranged from 19 to 59 years (M = 307 SD = 74) The me an work

expe rience was 108 years (SD = 65)

Measures

Dem ograph ic variables ( ie gende r and age ) functioned as control vari-

ables These variable s may confound the relationships betwe e n job charac-

te ristics and outcome variable s (e g Karase k amp Theorell 1990 Schaufeli

amp Van Die rendonck 1993 Warr 1987) Be cause type of un it may also play

a confounding role we controlle d for this variable too

Job demands and job autonom y are the predictor variable s In accordance

with the theoretical background we have tried to operationalize these con-

structs more precise ly and more comple te ly There fore these two measures

differ somewhat from Karase krsquos measures The two job characteristics include

both individual data and aggre gate d data (ie mean group scores of the 64

units are used) This means that there are two variable s for each job charac-

teristic one variable with individual scores and one variable with aggre gated

individual scores The se aggre gate -leve l variable s combine judgments across

individual jobs thus removing variance due to individual differences and idi-

osyncratic re sponses In order to minimize bias the subjective indicators of

our two job characteristics contain items with a minimum of cognitive proc-

essing In other words these items are precise ly defined and are as neutral as

possible (cf Frese 1989 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1987 Wall et al 1996)

Job dem ands were me asured by an eight-item questionnaire (5-point

response scale ranging from 1 = never to 5 = always) This scale was de-

ve loped by De Jonge Lande wee rd and Nijhuis (1993) and is extensive ly

validate d in Dutch samples We used a relative ly wide range of both quali-

tative and quantitative demanding aspects like working under pressure of

time job comple xity working hard and strenuous work The reliability of

this scale (Cronbachrsquos a ) is 85 An example of the items is ldquoIn the unit

where I work work is carrie d out under pressure of timerdquo

102 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

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d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ence or abse nce of certain job characte ristics (e g job demands and job

autonomy) may le ad to attitudinal and behavioural reactions such as job

satisfaction e xhaustion he alth complaints and e ven illness or disability

( e g Hackman amp O ldham 1980 Karasek amp The ore ll 1990 Schnall

Landsbergis amp Baker 1994 Siegrist Pe ter Junge Cre mer amp Seide l 1990

Warr 1987) As a consequence several the oretical models have been de-

ve loped to understand the relationship betwe en such job characte ristics and

employee reactions (cf Kahn amp Byosiere 1992) In ge neral these models

can be described as situation-centered or person-centered (cf Warr 1987)

Situation-centered mode ls focus primarily on e xplanatory factors or e vents

outside a particular worker while person-centered mode ls see k explana-

tions in the person whose actions are be ing studie d (e g cognitions habits

fee lings and nee ds)

A situation-centered mode l on which much of the current job rede sign

research and job stress research is based is the Job De mand-Control (JD-C)

Model deve loped by Karase k (1979) In its basic form the model postulates

that the primary sources of job stress lie within two basic characteristics of

the job itself (1) psychological job demands and (2) job decision latitude

Job demands are defined as psychological stressors that are present in the

work e nvironment (eg workload) Job de cision latitude or job control is

defined as ldquothe working individualrsquos potential control over his tasks and his

conduct during the working dayrdquo (Karasek 1979 pp 289-290)

Psychological strains are a consequence of the joint effects of the de-

mands of a job and the range of job control available to the employee The se

joint e ffects are also called interaction effects The first major prediction of

the JD -C Model is that the strongest ave rsive job-related strain reactions

( like e xhaustion job-relate d anxie ty and health complaints) will occur when

job de mands are high and workerrsquos control is low (ie high strain jobs) The

second prediction of the model which is some time s overlooked is that mo-

tivation le arning and personal growth will occur in situations where both job

demands and workerrsquos control are high (ie active jobs)

Te sts of the JD -C Model can be roughly divided into two cate gorie s

name ly (1) multi-occupation studies and (2) single -occupation studie s (cf

De Jonge 1995 Jones amp Fle tcher 1996) The forme r kind of studies are

usually large -scale e xaminations of national surveys that mainly focus on

cardiovascular disease s These studies freque ntly use an occupation le ve l

of analysis The latte r refers to individual le ve l self-report studie s that focus

on attitudinal outcome s (e g job satisfaction and work motivation) behav-

ioural outcome s (e g abse ntee ism and smoking consumption) and physi-

ological outcome s ( e g blood pre ssure and muscle te nsion) A large

number of studies evaluating the JD-C Model faile d to provide clear and

unam biguous support (De Jonge amp Kompie r 1997 Jone s amp Fle tche r

96 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

1996) Several conceptual as we ll as methodological criticisms have been

expre ssed in the lite rature that might e xplain the inconclusive re sults First

the re is some doubt as to the conceptualization and operationalization of

job demands and job decision latitude particularly in the multi-occupation

studies Job demands as used by Karasek seem to be a mixture of job stres-

sors job complexity and lack of control (Jones amp Fletcher 1996 Kasl

1996) For instance ldquohectic workrdquo may have different meanings depending

on the particular job of the re spondent In addition to this the original

scale of Karasek (1979 1985) includes not only purely descriptive items

but also affe ctive items which may le ad to spurious re lationships with the

depe nde nt variable s (cf Wall Jackson Mullarkey amp Parker 1996) Job

decision latitude reflects the term ldquojob autonomyrdquo as it is used in the job

redesign tradition but the operationalization of this construct also contains

eleme nts like skill leve l skill varie ty and e ven job scope or job comple xity

(Frese 1989 Ganster 1989 1995 Kasl 1996) So the me asurement of

both job demands and job decision latitude may be confused with other

job characte ristics

Second in multi-occupation studie s re sults may be confounded with

for instance socioeconomic status and health behaviour of the workers

Jobs concomitantly high in demands and low in control are likely ove r-

represented by e mployee s of low socioeconomic class and low health be-

haviour who share other risks for cardiovascular diseases (e g Sie grist e t

al 1990) Third the finding of significant inte raction e ffects of job de-

mands and job decision latitude may be affe cted by the use of different

me thods andor diffe re nt kinds of inte raction te rms (e g Kasl 1996

Landsbergis Schnall Warre n Pickering amp Schwartz 1994) More specifi-

cally both analysis of variance and regression analysis have been carried

out In general the first me thod produces re sults that are re lative ly often

in favor of the JD -C Model However it has been argue d that inte ractions

ideally should be tested with moderated regression analysis (Aiken amp West

1991 Landsbergis e t al 1994) Q uite often studies that use the latter do

not yie ld positive re sults (e g Payne amp Fle tche r 1983 Spe ctor 1987)

These differences in re sults can be e xplained by powe r differences betwe en

different statistical me thods Fourth it is also possible that the inconsis-

tentmdashinte ractivemdashfindings could be due to one or more moderator vari-

ables influe ncing re lations betwe e n job characte ristics and outcomes (eg

personality characte ristics or workplace social support) A number of re-

search studies have started in order to investigate these moderating e ffects

some of them with quite promising re sults (see Johnson 1989 Jones amp

Fletcher 1996 Parkes 1991 De Rijk Le Blanc Schaufeli amp De Jonge

1998)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 97

Finally an alternative explanation for the lack of consistency may be

the assessme nt of job characte ristics Basically the JD-C Model is situ-

ation-centered in that it emphasize s the particular role of the work envi-

ronme nt in the prediction of job-related strain It is self-evide nt that in

case s whe re the aim is to rede sign work indepe nde ntly of a particular

worker one nee ds more objective parame ters which are able to show to

have an impact on peoplersquos behaviour (Frese amp Z apf 1994) In other words

job de mands and job control are in the ory characteristics of jobs rather

than characte ristics of people

Job de mands and job control ge nerally have bee n measured by means

of se lf-report que stionnaires Howeve r the main problem with such ques-

tionnaire instrume nts is thatmdashas re flections of the objective work e nviron-

mentmdashthey are more prone to bias than objective instruments Se lf-report

que stionnaires me asure job characte ristics as perceive d by the individual

worker and may the re fore not reflect the objective task accurate ly (Karase k

amp Theore ll 1990) For instance someone can work in a job with high de-

mands and not report feelings of high workload

Consequently the me thodology of the JD -C studies (the multi-occu-

pation studie s in particular) has varied considerably Most studies re ly heav-

ily on the individualrsquos perception or description of job characte ristics (cf

Soumlde rfeldt Soumlderfeldt Jones O rsquoCampo Muntaner O hlson amp Warg 1996)

A few have highlighted the grouprsquos perception or description as a re flection

of the objective environment (cf De Jonge amp Kompier 1997 Schnall e t

al 1994) This point will be discussed in more detail in the next section

THE ASSESSMENT OF JOB CHARACTE RISTICS

The job characteristics of the JD-C Model have bee n measured in two

different ways (1) ldquoobjective rdquo and (2) ldquosubjectiverdquo (Karase k amp Theorell

1990 Kristensen 1995) ldquoO bjectiverdquo and ldquosubjectiverdquo have been put in quo-

tation marks because they are used inconsistently in the literature on work-

stress So-calle d ldquoobjective rdquo job characte ristics may be de fine d as ones

which are assessed independently of the job incumbent (cf Fre se amp Zapf

1988 1994 Spe ctor 1992) Examples are physical and social characteristics

of the work e nvironment or expe rt ratings Accordingly ldquosubjectiverdquo job

characte ristics are de pendent on employe ersquos cognitive and e motional proc-

essing (like appraisals) and the ir ability in coping (Fre se amp Zapf 1988

1994 Lazarus 1995)

Currently the objective method is carried out through (1) direct in-

depe nde nt me asurement and (2) observe rsrsquo ratings (e g Frese amp Zapf

1988 Kristensen 1995 Schnall e t al 1994 Theorell amp Karasek 1996)

The main problem with direct measurement of objective characteristics is

98 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

that some aspe cts are difficult to e xpress in concre te physical te rms (Warr

1987) For e xample job autonomy and job clarity do not provide usable

ge neral marke rs The second approach seems to be objective as me ntioned

above but may be influenced by observersrsquo bias The measurement yie lds

incomple te and partially invalid information due to limited observation

time or space and the e ffects of the observation itse lf (Fre se amp Z apf 1988)

Additionally obse rve rsrsquo ratings see m to suffer from stronge r halo and

stereotyping effects than subjectsrsquo assessments (Frese 1985 Semmer Zapf

amp Gre if 1996 Spector Brannick amp Coove rt 1989)

The subjective method is usually carried out by means of se lf-report

questionnaire s This kind of me asureme nt has several problems as we ll

(e g Frese 1985 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1989 1996 Spector 1992

Zapf 1989) such as (1) conceptual overlap betwe en indepe ndent and de-

pendent me asures in that both me asures reflect the same construct (2)

common me thod variance because the information is derive d from the

same source (eg central tendency acquiescence) (3) influence of a third

variable that causes a spurious re lationship (eg a pe rsonal trait) (4) the

potential influencemdashor alterationmdashof the e stimation of job characteristics

due to the presence of an outcome variable (e g health complaints) (5)

possible e ffect of demand characte ristics of the re search context and e x-

perimenter e ffects re sulting in false correlations betwe en job characteristics

and outcome variable s (6) job incumbents may be so used to the ir work

situation that they deny some of the occupational hazards

Spector (1992) argued that more work nee ds to be done e xploring the

accuracy of reports both from the perspective of the job incumbent and

from alte rnative sources to reflect the work conditions O ne way to avoid

the above -me ntioned problems as far as possible is to look for such alte r-

native sources So-calle d group assessm ents seem to be ve ry useful in meas-

uring job characte ristics (Frese 1985 1989 Fre se amp Zapf 1988 Spector

1992) By group assessments we mean that the scores of job incumbents

with the same job and working in ne arly identical workplaces are aggre -

gate d into one ge neral score The group assessments can be described as

the group e stimate s of the re spective job characte ristic for each job incum-

bent These me asures re fe r to that part of a particular job characteristic

that different workers doing ne arly the same job have in common (see also

Semme r e t al 1996) In other words group asse ssments are base d on the

concept of the ideal typical worker ( ie an ave rage worker with sufficient

skills to perform his or he r tasks) According to Fre se and Zapf (1988

1994) group assessments are more objective measures in the sense that

the influence of idiosyncraticmdashindividualmdashperceptions and possibly illusory

answers are reduced In addition to this the e xpertise of workers is taken

into account and problems of brie f pe riods of observation are avoide d Fi-

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 99

nally group assessments see m to be less subject to methodological prob-

le ms such as attenuation because unsystematic error variance is reduced

Thus group data are likely to be more reliable than individual assessme nts

Theoretical justification for considering group assessments as more ob-

je ctive me asures of the two job characte ristics in the JD-C Model can be

found in the literature on social and inte ractional psychology industrial

and organizational psychology and organizational behaviour and e cology

(eg Alderfer 1987 Baron amp Boudreau 1987 Gibson 1979 Hackman

1976 Kraheacute 1992 Schneide r 1987 Warr 1987) From the point of view

of modern interactionism for instance there e xists situational features that

can be consensually regarde d as part of the situation These features are

conceptualized as situational ldquoaffordance srdquo and are constructs that imply

the complimentarity of both work e nvironments and workers What makes

the features ldquoquasi-objectiverdquo is the fact that they be long to the work situ-

ation irrespective of whe the r or not the job incumbent recognizes them as

such For e xample a danger signal te lls a majority of workers to run to

the e me rge ncy e xit Affordance s have some conce ptual similarity with

Hackman rsquos (1976) ldquogroup-supplied stimulirdquoAnother justification is provide d by Schne ide rrsquos (1987) ASA frame-

work This framework sugge sts that employe es will expe rience similar work-

ing conditions due to attraction se lection and attrition processes in an

organization This re sults in similarity in behaviour within a work se tting

In othe r words the pe ople make the workplace (Schneide r 1987) Al-

though Schneider bases his framework primarily at the organizational leve l

it is most likely that his ideas can be e mployed at the group le ve l of analysis

The claim that group assessment ( ie aggre gated data) is more ob-

je ctive is corroborate d by se ve ral e mpirical findings For instance a

me taanalysis of 16 conve rge nce studie s conducte d by Spe ctor (1992)

showe d that aggre gate -leve l corre lations betwee n job characte ristics and

outcome s were similar to individual le ve l correlations Moreover it ap-

peared that the converge nt validity at the aggre gate d le ve l was rather large

and e ven large r than at the individual leve l

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to test the JD-C Model using both group

and individual indicators of job characteristics The reason why we used

group and individual assessments of job demands and job autonomy is that

we want to find out whether aggre gated job characte ristics data significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics data with regard to

employee he alth In othe r words the key question is whether aggre gated

job characteristics e xplain additional variance in individualsrsquo attitudinal re-

100 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

actions This could mean that some of the explained variance of employe e

health is attributable to some more objective features outside the individual

pe rce ption or asse ssme nt (e g affordance s or group-supplie d stimuli)

which has important theoretical and practical conseque nces For instance

if job-relate d strain captures group le ve l variance the aspirations of the

JD -C Model to be situation-centered would rece ive support In addition

to all this we tried to measure the two job characte ristics (job demands

and job autonomy) more precise ly and e xte nsive ly Lastly the inte raction

effect of demands and autonomy was tested with regre ssion techniques in-

cluding a multiplicative interaction term (cf Aiken amp West 1991 Jaccard

Turrisi amp Wan 1990 Landsbergis et al 1994)

We tested the JD-C Model in a single -occupation sample of health care

workers because the ir professions are ve ry suitable for testing the JD-C

Model for several reasons (e g Fox Dwye r amp Ganster 1993 Ganster amp

Fusilier 1989) First health care workers seem to be subject to stressful work

conditions (ie high job demands) Second job autonomy is an important

tool in present-day care de livery systems Third because of different types of

health care areas and different specialties he alth care workers are a re lative ly

hete rogeneous group Moreover Ganster and Fusilie r (1989) showed that

there is as much variability in health care sample s as there is across a fairly

wide range of occupations Finally the relative homogeneity in social class

restricts the confounding e ffect of socioeconomic status

In line with the JD-C Model it is hypothesized that job demands and

job autonomy have an interaction effect with respect to e mployee he alth

To be more specific we e xpe ct that job autonomy attenuates the adve rse

effects of job demands on employe e health In addition to this we will

compare aggre gated and individual data by means of the variance to be

explaine d We e xpect that give n that aggre gated data correspond to the

more objective work conditions then if the JD-C Model is correct the

use of aggre gated data should reve al stronger interaction e ffects

METHOD

Sam ple

A random sample of 16 institutions was drawn from all gene ral hos-

pitals and nursing home s in the Netherlands (N = 218) Eight general hos-

pitals and e ight nursing home s participated in the study He alth care

workers in four units in each institute we re asked to comple te a que stion-

naire Six types of units were present in the sample an intensive care unit

(ICU) a psychiatric unit an inte rnal unit a surgical unit a somatic unit

and finally a psychogeriatric unit The initial sample consisted of 1806

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 101

health care workers from 64 units including nurses nursesrsquo aide s student

nurses activity therapists secretarie s and kitchen staff Self-report ques-

tionnaire s were fille d in and 1489 responde nts returne d the completed

que stionnaire by post (82 response ) In order to keep the work situation

roughly constant across individuals within a give n unit we only included

health care workers with the same job leve l name ly registe red nurses (cf

Thomas 1986) Furthermore only workers who had bee n e mployed for

more than 3 months we re included in the final sample in order to e nsure

valid and reliable observations of the work situation (cf Frese amp Zapf

1994 Katz 1978) These two restrictions reduce the sample to 895 regis-

te red nurses E ighty-four percent of the re spondents were wome n and the

age ranged from 19 to 59 years (M = 307 SD = 74) The me an work

expe rience was 108 years (SD = 65)

Measures

Dem ograph ic variables ( ie gende r and age ) functioned as control vari-

ables These variable s may confound the relationships betwe e n job charac-

te ristics and outcome variable s (e g Karase k amp Theorell 1990 Schaufeli

amp Van Die rendonck 1993 Warr 1987) Be cause type of un it may also play

a confounding role we controlle d for this variable too

Job demands and job autonom y are the predictor variable s In accordance

with the theoretical background we have tried to operationalize these con-

structs more precise ly and more comple te ly There fore these two measures

differ somewhat from Karase krsquos measures The two job characteristics include

both individual data and aggre gate d data (ie mean group scores of the 64

units are used) This means that there are two variable s for each job charac-

teristic one variable with individual scores and one variable with aggre gated

individual scores The se aggre gate -leve l variable s combine judgments across

individual jobs thus removing variance due to individual differences and idi-

osyncratic re sponses In order to minimize bias the subjective indicators of

our two job characteristics contain items with a minimum of cognitive proc-

essing In other words these items are precise ly defined and are as neutral as

possible (cf Frese 1989 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1987 Wall et al 1996)

Job dem ands were me asured by an eight-item questionnaire (5-point

response scale ranging from 1 = never to 5 = always) This scale was de-

ve loped by De Jonge Lande wee rd and Nijhuis (1993) and is extensive ly

validate d in Dutch samples We used a relative ly wide range of both quali-

tative and quantitative demanding aspects like working under pressure of

time job comple xity working hard and strenuous work The reliability of

this scale (Cronbachrsquos a ) is 85 An example of the items is ldquoIn the unit

where I work work is carrie d out under pressure of timerdquo

102 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

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ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

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BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

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317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

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FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

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Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

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GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

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JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

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validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

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KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

1996) Several conceptual as we ll as methodological criticisms have been

expre ssed in the lite rature that might e xplain the inconclusive re sults First

the re is some doubt as to the conceptualization and operationalization of

job demands and job decision latitude particularly in the multi-occupation

studies Job demands as used by Karasek seem to be a mixture of job stres-

sors job complexity and lack of control (Jones amp Fletcher 1996 Kasl

1996) For instance ldquohectic workrdquo may have different meanings depending

on the particular job of the re spondent In addition to this the original

scale of Karasek (1979 1985) includes not only purely descriptive items

but also affe ctive items which may le ad to spurious re lationships with the

depe nde nt variable s (cf Wall Jackson Mullarkey amp Parker 1996) Job

decision latitude reflects the term ldquojob autonomyrdquo as it is used in the job

redesign tradition but the operationalization of this construct also contains

eleme nts like skill leve l skill varie ty and e ven job scope or job comple xity

(Frese 1989 Ganster 1989 1995 Kasl 1996) So the me asurement of

both job demands and job decision latitude may be confused with other

job characte ristics

Second in multi-occupation studie s re sults may be confounded with

for instance socioeconomic status and health behaviour of the workers

Jobs concomitantly high in demands and low in control are likely ove r-

represented by e mployee s of low socioeconomic class and low health be-

haviour who share other risks for cardiovascular diseases (e g Sie grist e t

al 1990) Third the finding of significant inte raction e ffects of job de-

mands and job decision latitude may be affe cted by the use of different

me thods andor diffe re nt kinds of inte raction te rms (e g Kasl 1996

Landsbergis Schnall Warre n Pickering amp Schwartz 1994) More specifi-

cally both analysis of variance and regression analysis have been carried

out In general the first me thod produces re sults that are re lative ly often

in favor of the JD -C Model However it has been argue d that inte ractions

ideally should be tested with moderated regression analysis (Aiken amp West

1991 Landsbergis e t al 1994) Q uite often studies that use the latter do

not yie ld positive re sults (e g Payne amp Fle tche r 1983 Spe ctor 1987)

These differences in re sults can be e xplained by powe r differences betwe en

different statistical me thods Fourth it is also possible that the inconsis-

tentmdashinte ractivemdashfindings could be due to one or more moderator vari-

ables influe ncing re lations betwe e n job characte ristics and outcomes (eg

personality characte ristics or workplace social support) A number of re-

search studies have started in order to investigate these moderating e ffects

some of them with quite promising re sults (see Johnson 1989 Jones amp

Fletcher 1996 Parkes 1991 De Rijk Le Blanc Schaufeli amp De Jonge

1998)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 97

Finally an alternative explanation for the lack of consistency may be

the assessme nt of job characte ristics Basically the JD-C Model is situ-

ation-centered in that it emphasize s the particular role of the work envi-

ronme nt in the prediction of job-related strain It is self-evide nt that in

case s whe re the aim is to rede sign work indepe nde ntly of a particular

worker one nee ds more objective parame ters which are able to show to

have an impact on peoplersquos behaviour (Frese amp Z apf 1994) In other words

job de mands and job control are in the ory characteristics of jobs rather

than characte ristics of people

Job de mands and job control ge nerally have bee n measured by means

of se lf-report que stionnaires Howeve r the main problem with such ques-

tionnaire instrume nts is thatmdashas re flections of the objective work e nviron-

mentmdashthey are more prone to bias than objective instruments Se lf-report

que stionnaires me asure job characte ristics as perceive d by the individual

worker and may the re fore not reflect the objective task accurate ly (Karase k

amp Theore ll 1990) For instance someone can work in a job with high de-

mands and not report feelings of high workload

Consequently the me thodology of the JD -C studies (the multi-occu-

pation studie s in particular) has varied considerably Most studies re ly heav-

ily on the individualrsquos perception or description of job characte ristics (cf

Soumlde rfeldt Soumlderfeldt Jones O rsquoCampo Muntaner O hlson amp Warg 1996)

A few have highlighted the grouprsquos perception or description as a re flection

of the objective environment (cf De Jonge amp Kompier 1997 Schnall e t

al 1994) This point will be discussed in more detail in the next section

THE ASSESSMENT OF JOB CHARACTE RISTICS

The job characteristics of the JD-C Model have bee n measured in two

different ways (1) ldquoobjective rdquo and (2) ldquosubjectiverdquo (Karase k amp Theorell

1990 Kristensen 1995) ldquoO bjectiverdquo and ldquosubjectiverdquo have been put in quo-

tation marks because they are used inconsistently in the literature on work-

stress So-calle d ldquoobjective rdquo job characte ristics may be de fine d as ones

which are assessed independently of the job incumbent (cf Fre se amp Zapf

1988 1994 Spe ctor 1992) Examples are physical and social characteristics

of the work e nvironment or expe rt ratings Accordingly ldquosubjectiverdquo job

characte ristics are de pendent on employe ersquos cognitive and e motional proc-

essing (like appraisals) and the ir ability in coping (Fre se amp Zapf 1988

1994 Lazarus 1995)

Currently the objective method is carried out through (1) direct in-

depe nde nt me asurement and (2) observe rsrsquo ratings (e g Frese amp Zapf

1988 Kristensen 1995 Schnall e t al 1994 Theorell amp Karasek 1996)

The main problem with direct measurement of objective characteristics is

98 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

that some aspe cts are difficult to e xpress in concre te physical te rms (Warr

1987) For e xample job autonomy and job clarity do not provide usable

ge neral marke rs The second approach seems to be objective as me ntioned

above but may be influenced by observersrsquo bias The measurement yie lds

incomple te and partially invalid information due to limited observation

time or space and the e ffects of the observation itse lf (Fre se amp Z apf 1988)

Additionally obse rve rsrsquo ratings see m to suffer from stronge r halo and

stereotyping effects than subjectsrsquo assessments (Frese 1985 Semmer Zapf

amp Gre if 1996 Spector Brannick amp Coove rt 1989)

The subjective method is usually carried out by means of se lf-report

questionnaire s This kind of me asureme nt has several problems as we ll

(e g Frese 1985 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1989 1996 Spector 1992

Zapf 1989) such as (1) conceptual overlap betwe en indepe ndent and de-

pendent me asures in that both me asures reflect the same construct (2)

common me thod variance because the information is derive d from the

same source (eg central tendency acquiescence) (3) influence of a third

variable that causes a spurious re lationship (eg a pe rsonal trait) (4) the

potential influencemdashor alterationmdashof the e stimation of job characteristics

due to the presence of an outcome variable (e g health complaints) (5)

possible e ffect of demand characte ristics of the re search context and e x-

perimenter e ffects re sulting in false correlations betwe en job characteristics

and outcome variable s (6) job incumbents may be so used to the ir work

situation that they deny some of the occupational hazards

Spector (1992) argued that more work nee ds to be done e xploring the

accuracy of reports both from the perspective of the job incumbent and

from alte rnative sources to reflect the work conditions O ne way to avoid

the above -me ntioned problems as far as possible is to look for such alte r-

native sources So-calle d group assessm ents seem to be ve ry useful in meas-

uring job characte ristics (Frese 1985 1989 Fre se amp Zapf 1988 Spector

1992) By group assessments we mean that the scores of job incumbents

with the same job and working in ne arly identical workplaces are aggre -

gate d into one ge neral score The group assessments can be described as

the group e stimate s of the re spective job characte ristic for each job incum-

bent These me asures re fe r to that part of a particular job characteristic

that different workers doing ne arly the same job have in common (see also

Semme r e t al 1996) In other words group asse ssments are base d on the

concept of the ideal typical worker ( ie an ave rage worker with sufficient

skills to perform his or he r tasks) According to Fre se and Zapf (1988

1994) group assessments are more objective measures in the sense that

the influence of idiosyncraticmdashindividualmdashperceptions and possibly illusory

answers are reduced In addition to this the e xpertise of workers is taken

into account and problems of brie f pe riods of observation are avoide d Fi-

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 99

nally group assessments see m to be less subject to methodological prob-

le ms such as attenuation because unsystematic error variance is reduced

Thus group data are likely to be more reliable than individual assessme nts

Theoretical justification for considering group assessments as more ob-

je ctive me asures of the two job characte ristics in the JD-C Model can be

found in the literature on social and inte ractional psychology industrial

and organizational psychology and organizational behaviour and e cology

(eg Alderfer 1987 Baron amp Boudreau 1987 Gibson 1979 Hackman

1976 Kraheacute 1992 Schneide r 1987 Warr 1987) From the point of view

of modern interactionism for instance there e xists situational features that

can be consensually regarde d as part of the situation These features are

conceptualized as situational ldquoaffordance srdquo and are constructs that imply

the complimentarity of both work e nvironments and workers What makes

the features ldquoquasi-objectiverdquo is the fact that they be long to the work situ-

ation irrespective of whe the r or not the job incumbent recognizes them as

such For e xample a danger signal te lls a majority of workers to run to

the e me rge ncy e xit Affordance s have some conce ptual similarity with

Hackman rsquos (1976) ldquogroup-supplied stimulirdquoAnother justification is provide d by Schne ide rrsquos (1987) ASA frame-

work This framework sugge sts that employe es will expe rience similar work-

ing conditions due to attraction se lection and attrition processes in an

organization This re sults in similarity in behaviour within a work se tting

In othe r words the pe ople make the workplace (Schneide r 1987) Al-

though Schneider bases his framework primarily at the organizational leve l

it is most likely that his ideas can be e mployed at the group le ve l of analysis

The claim that group assessment ( ie aggre gated data) is more ob-

je ctive is corroborate d by se ve ral e mpirical findings For instance a

me taanalysis of 16 conve rge nce studie s conducte d by Spe ctor (1992)

showe d that aggre gate -leve l corre lations betwee n job characte ristics and

outcome s were similar to individual le ve l correlations Moreover it ap-

peared that the converge nt validity at the aggre gate d le ve l was rather large

and e ven large r than at the individual leve l

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to test the JD-C Model using both group

and individual indicators of job characteristics The reason why we used

group and individual assessments of job demands and job autonomy is that

we want to find out whether aggre gated job characte ristics data significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics data with regard to

employee he alth In othe r words the key question is whether aggre gated

job characteristics e xplain additional variance in individualsrsquo attitudinal re-

100 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

actions This could mean that some of the explained variance of employe e

health is attributable to some more objective features outside the individual

pe rce ption or asse ssme nt (e g affordance s or group-supplie d stimuli)

which has important theoretical and practical conseque nces For instance

if job-relate d strain captures group le ve l variance the aspirations of the

JD -C Model to be situation-centered would rece ive support In addition

to all this we tried to measure the two job characte ristics (job demands

and job autonomy) more precise ly and e xte nsive ly Lastly the inte raction

effect of demands and autonomy was tested with regre ssion techniques in-

cluding a multiplicative interaction term (cf Aiken amp West 1991 Jaccard

Turrisi amp Wan 1990 Landsbergis et al 1994)

We tested the JD-C Model in a single -occupation sample of health care

workers because the ir professions are ve ry suitable for testing the JD-C

Model for several reasons (e g Fox Dwye r amp Ganster 1993 Ganster amp

Fusilier 1989) First health care workers seem to be subject to stressful work

conditions (ie high job demands) Second job autonomy is an important

tool in present-day care de livery systems Third because of different types of

health care areas and different specialties he alth care workers are a re lative ly

hete rogeneous group Moreover Ganster and Fusilie r (1989) showed that

there is as much variability in health care sample s as there is across a fairly

wide range of occupations Finally the relative homogeneity in social class

restricts the confounding e ffect of socioeconomic status

In line with the JD-C Model it is hypothesized that job demands and

job autonomy have an interaction effect with respect to e mployee he alth

To be more specific we e xpe ct that job autonomy attenuates the adve rse

effects of job demands on employe e health In addition to this we will

compare aggre gated and individual data by means of the variance to be

explaine d We e xpect that give n that aggre gated data correspond to the

more objective work conditions then if the JD-C Model is correct the

use of aggre gated data should reve al stronger interaction e ffects

METHOD

Sam ple

A random sample of 16 institutions was drawn from all gene ral hos-

pitals and nursing home s in the Netherlands (N = 218) Eight general hos-

pitals and e ight nursing home s participated in the study He alth care

workers in four units in each institute we re asked to comple te a que stion-

naire Six types of units were present in the sample an intensive care unit

(ICU) a psychiatric unit an inte rnal unit a surgical unit a somatic unit

and finally a psychogeriatric unit The initial sample consisted of 1806

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 101

health care workers from 64 units including nurses nursesrsquo aide s student

nurses activity therapists secretarie s and kitchen staff Self-report ques-

tionnaire s were fille d in and 1489 responde nts returne d the completed

que stionnaire by post (82 response ) In order to keep the work situation

roughly constant across individuals within a give n unit we only included

health care workers with the same job leve l name ly registe red nurses (cf

Thomas 1986) Furthermore only workers who had bee n e mployed for

more than 3 months we re included in the final sample in order to e nsure

valid and reliable observations of the work situation (cf Frese amp Zapf

1994 Katz 1978) These two restrictions reduce the sample to 895 regis-

te red nurses E ighty-four percent of the re spondents were wome n and the

age ranged from 19 to 59 years (M = 307 SD = 74) The me an work

expe rience was 108 years (SD = 65)

Measures

Dem ograph ic variables ( ie gende r and age ) functioned as control vari-

ables These variable s may confound the relationships betwe e n job charac-

te ristics and outcome variable s (e g Karase k amp Theorell 1990 Schaufeli

amp Van Die rendonck 1993 Warr 1987) Be cause type of un it may also play

a confounding role we controlle d for this variable too

Job demands and job autonom y are the predictor variable s In accordance

with the theoretical background we have tried to operationalize these con-

structs more precise ly and more comple te ly There fore these two measures

differ somewhat from Karase krsquos measures The two job characteristics include

both individual data and aggre gate d data (ie mean group scores of the 64

units are used) This means that there are two variable s for each job charac-

teristic one variable with individual scores and one variable with aggre gated

individual scores The se aggre gate -leve l variable s combine judgments across

individual jobs thus removing variance due to individual differences and idi-

osyncratic re sponses In order to minimize bias the subjective indicators of

our two job characteristics contain items with a minimum of cognitive proc-

essing In other words these items are precise ly defined and are as neutral as

possible (cf Frese 1989 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1987 Wall et al 1996)

Job dem ands were me asured by an eight-item questionnaire (5-point

response scale ranging from 1 = never to 5 = always) This scale was de-

ve loped by De Jonge Lande wee rd and Nijhuis (1993) and is extensive ly

validate d in Dutch samples We used a relative ly wide range of both quali-

tative and quantitative demanding aspects like working under pressure of

time job comple xity working hard and strenuous work The reliability of

this scale (Cronbachrsquos a ) is 85 An example of the items is ldquoIn the unit

where I work work is carrie d out under pressure of timerdquo

102 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

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(n=

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D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

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30

70

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4

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d

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8

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macr2

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macr02

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69

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macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

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macr0

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macr13

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macr26

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macr0

7

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macr1

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80

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macr01

macr10

macr0

9

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61

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macr11

macr2

5

macr11

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Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

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macr16

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macr28

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macr27

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Inte

rna

lmacr

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macr14

15

Su

rgic

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macrmacr

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macr0

41

5

macr00

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macr14

macr1

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16

So

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tic

macrmacr

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macr0

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macr2

2

macr11

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5

macr46

macr1

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macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

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rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

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macr06

macr21

macr2

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macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

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s)

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ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Finally an alternative explanation for the lack of consistency may be

the assessme nt of job characte ristics Basically the JD-C Model is situ-

ation-centered in that it emphasize s the particular role of the work envi-

ronme nt in the prediction of job-related strain It is self-evide nt that in

case s whe re the aim is to rede sign work indepe nde ntly of a particular

worker one nee ds more objective parame ters which are able to show to

have an impact on peoplersquos behaviour (Frese amp Z apf 1994) In other words

job de mands and job control are in the ory characteristics of jobs rather

than characte ristics of people

Job de mands and job control ge nerally have bee n measured by means

of se lf-report que stionnaires Howeve r the main problem with such ques-

tionnaire instrume nts is thatmdashas re flections of the objective work e nviron-

mentmdashthey are more prone to bias than objective instruments Se lf-report

que stionnaires me asure job characte ristics as perceive d by the individual

worker and may the re fore not reflect the objective task accurate ly (Karase k

amp Theore ll 1990) For instance someone can work in a job with high de-

mands and not report feelings of high workload

Consequently the me thodology of the JD -C studies (the multi-occu-

pation studie s in particular) has varied considerably Most studies re ly heav-

ily on the individualrsquos perception or description of job characte ristics (cf

Soumlde rfeldt Soumlderfeldt Jones O rsquoCampo Muntaner O hlson amp Warg 1996)

A few have highlighted the grouprsquos perception or description as a re flection

of the objective environment (cf De Jonge amp Kompier 1997 Schnall e t

al 1994) This point will be discussed in more detail in the next section

THE ASSESSMENT OF JOB CHARACTE RISTICS

The job characteristics of the JD-C Model have bee n measured in two

different ways (1) ldquoobjective rdquo and (2) ldquosubjectiverdquo (Karase k amp Theorell

1990 Kristensen 1995) ldquoO bjectiverdquo and ldquosubjectiverdquo have been put in quo-

tation marks because they are used inconsistently in the literature on work-

stress So-calle d ldquoobjective rdquo job characte ristics may be de fine d as ones

which are assessed independently of the job incumbent (cf Fre se amp Zapf

1988 1994 Spe ctor 1992) Examples are physical and social characteristics

of the work e nvironment or expe rt ratings Accordingly ldquosubjectiverdquo job

characte ristics are de pendent on employe ersquos cognitive and e motional proc-

essing (like appraisals) and the ir ability in coping (Fre se amp Zapf 1988

1994 Lazarus 1995)

Currently the objective method is carried out through (1) direct in-

depe nde nt me asurement and (2) observe rsrsquo ratings (e g Frese amp Zapf

1988 Kristensen 1995 Schnall e t al 1994 Theorell amp Karasek 1996)

The main problem with direct measurement of objective characteristics is

98 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

that some aspe cts are difficult to e xpress in concre te physical te rms (Warr

1987) For e xample job autonomy and job clarity do not provide usable

ge neral marke rs The second approach seems to be objective as me ntioned

above but may be influenced by observersrsquo bias The measurement yie lds

incomple te and partially invalid information due to limited observation

time or space and the e ffects of the observation itse lf (Fre se amp Z apf 1988)

Additionally obse rve rsrsquo ratings see m to suffer from stronge r halo and

stereotyping effects than subjectsrsquo assessments (Frese 1985 Semmer Zapf

amp Gre if 1996 Spector Brannick amp Coove rt 1989)

The subjective method is usually carried out by means of se lf-report

questionnaire s This kind of me asureme nt has several problems as we ll

(e g Frese 1985 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1989 1996 Spector 1992

Zapf 1989) such as (1) conceptual overlap betwe en indepe ndent and de-

pendent me asures in that both me asures reflect the same construct (2)

common me thod variance because the information is derive d from the

same source (eg central tendency acquiescence) (3) influence of a third

variable that causes a spurious re lationship (eg a pe rsonal trait) (4) the

potential influencemdashor alterationmdashof the e stimation of job characteristics

due to the presence of an outcome variable (e g health complaints) (5)

possible e ffect of demand characte ristics of the re search context and e x-

perimenter e ffects re sulting in false correlations betwe en job characteristics

and outcome variable s (6) job incumbents may be so used to the ir work

situation that they deny some of the occupational hazards

Spector (1992) argued that more work nee ds to be done e xploring the

accuracy of reports both from the perspective of the job incumbent and

from alte rnative sources to reflect the work conditions O ne way to avoid

the above -me ntioned problems as far as possible is to look for such alte r-

native sources So-calle d group assessm ents seem to be ve ry useful in meas-

uring job characte ristics (Frese 1985 1989 Fre se amp Zapf 1988 Spector

1992) By group assessments we mean that the scores of job incumbents

with the same job and working in ne arly identical workplaces are aggre -

gate d into one ge neral score The group assessments can be described as

the group e stimate s of the re spective job characte ristic for each job incum-

bent These me asures re fe r to that part of a particular job characteristic

that different workers doing ne arly the same job have in common (see also

Semme r e t al 1996) In other words group asse ssments are base d on the

concept of the ideal typical worker ( ie an ave rage worker with sufficient

skills to perform his or he r tasks) According to Fre se and Zapf (1988

1994) group assessments are more objective measures in the sense that

the influence of idiosyncraticmdashindividualmdashperceptions and possibly illusory

answers are reduced In addition to this the e xpertise of workers is taken

into account and problems of brie f pe riods of observation are avoide d Fi-

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 99

nally group assessments see m to be less subject to methodological prob-

le ms such as attenuation because unsystematic error variance is reduced

Thus group data are likely to be more reliable than individual assessme nts

Theoretical justification for considering group assessments as more ob-

je ctive me asures of the two job characte ristics in the JD-C Model can be

found in the literature on social and inte ractional psychology industrial

and organizational psychology and organizational behaviour and e cology

(eg Alderfer 1987 Baron amp Boudreau 1987 Gibson 1979 Hackman

1976 Kraheacute 1992 Schneide r 1987 Warr 1987) From the point of view

of modern interactionism for instance there e xists situational features that

can be consensually regarde d as part of the situation These features are

conceptualized as situational ldquoaffordance srdquo and are constructs that imply

the complimentarity of both work e nvironments and workers What makes

the features ldquoquasi-objectiverdquo is the fact that they be long to the work situ-

ation irrespective of whe the r or not the job incumbent recognizes them as

such For e xample a danger signal te lls a majority of workers to run to

the e me rge ncy e xit Affordance s have some conce ptual similarity with

Hackman rsquos (1976) ldquogroup-supplied stimulirdquoAnother justification is provide d by Schne ide rrsquos (1987) ASA frame-

work This framework sugge sts that employe es will expe rience similar work-

ing conditions due to attraction se lection and attrition processes in an

organization This re sults in similarity in behaviour within a work se tting

In othe r words the pe ople make the workplace (Schneide r 1987) Al-

though Schneider bases his framework primarily at the organizational leve l

it is most likely that his ideas can be e mployed at the group le ve l of analysis

The claim that group assessment ( ie aggre gated data) is more ob-

je ctive is corroborate d by se ve ral e mpirical findings For instance a

me taanalysis of 16 conve rge nce studie s conducte d by Spe ctor (1992)

showe d that aggre gate -leve l corre lations betwee n job characte ristics and

outcome s were similar to individual le ve l correlations Moreover it ap-

peared that the converge nt validity at the aggre gate d le ve l was rather large

and e ven large r than at the individual leve l

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to test the JD-C Model using both group

and individual indicators of job characteristics The reason why we used

group and individual assessments of job demands and job autonomy is that

we want to find out whether aggre gated job characte ristics data significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics data with regard to

employee he alth In othe r words the key question is whether aggre gated

job characteristics e xplain additional variance in individualsrsquo attitudinal re-

100 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

actions This could mean that some of the explained variance of employe e

health is attributable to some more objective features outside the individual

pe rce ption or asse ssme nt (e g affordance s or group-supplie d stimuli)

which has important theoretical and practical conseque nces For instance

if job-relate d strain captures group le ve l variance the aspirations of the

JD -C Model to be situation-centered would rece ive support In addition

to all this we tried to measure the two job characte ristics (job demands

and job autonomy) more precise ly and e xte nsive ly Lastly the inte raction

effect of demands and autonomy was tested with regre ssion techniques in-

cluding a multiplicative interaction term (cf Aiken amp West 1991 Jaccard

Turrisi amp Wan 1990 Landsbergis et al 1994)

We tested the JD-C Model in a single -occupation sample of health care

workers because the ir professions are ve ry suitable for testing the JD-C

Model for several reasons (e g Fox Dwye r amp Ganster 1993 Ganster amp

Fusilier 1989) First health care workers seem to be subject to stressful work

conditions (ie high job demands) Second job autonomy is an important

tool in present-day care de livery systems Third because of different types of

health care areas and different specialties he alth care workers are a re lative ly

hete rogeneous group Moreover Ganster and Fusilie r (1989) showed that

there is as much variability in health care sample s as there is across a fairly

wide range of occupations Finally the relative homogeneity in social class

restricts the confounding e ffect of socioeconomic status

In line with the JD-C Model it is hypothesized that job demands and

job autonomy have an interaction effect with respect to e mployee he alth

To be more specific we e xpe ct that job autonomy attenuates the adve rse

effects of job demands on employe e health In addition to this we will

compare aggre gated and individual data by means of the variance to be

explaine d We e xpect that give n that aggre gated data correspond to the

more objective work conditions then if the JD-C Model is correct the

use of aggre gated data should reve al stronger interaction e ffects

METHOD

Sam ple

A random sample of 16 institutions was drawn from all gene ral hos-

pitals and nursing home s in the Netherlands (N = 218) Eight general hos-

pitals and e ight nursing home s participated in the study He alth care

workers in four units in each institute we re asked to comple te a que stion-

naire Six types of units were present in the sample an intensive care unit

(ICU) a psychiatric unit an inte rnal unit a surgical unit a somatic unit

and finally a psychogeriatric unit The initial sample consisted of 1806

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 101

health care workers from 64 units including nurses nursesrsquo aide s student

nurses activity therapists secretarie s and kitchen staff Self-report ques-

tionnaire s were fille d in and 1489 responde nts returne d the completed

que stionnaire by post (82 response ) In order to keep the work situation

roughly constant across individuals within a give n unit we only included

health care workers with the same job leve l name ly registe red nurses (cf

Thomas 1986) Furthermore only workers who had bee n e mployed for

more than 3 months we re included in the final sample in order to e nsure

valid and reliable observations of the work situation (cf Frese amp Zapf

1994 Katz 1978) These two restrictions reduce the sample to 895 regis-

te red nurses E ighty-four percent of the re spondents were wome n and the

age ranged from 19 to 59 years (M = 307 SD = 74) The me an work

expe rience was 108 years (SD = 65)

Measures

Dem ograph ic variables ( ie gende r and age ) functioned as control vari-

ables These variable s may confound the relationships betwe e n job charac-

te ristics and outcome variable s (e g Karase k amp Theorell 1990 Schaufeli

amp Van Die rendonck 1993 Warr 1987) Be cause type of un it may also play

a confounding role we controlle d for this variable too

Job demands and job autonom y are the predictor variable s In accordance

with the theoretical background we have tried to operationalize these con-

structs more precise ly and more comple te ly There fore these two measures

differ somewhat from Karase krsquos measures The two job characteristics include

both individual data and aggre gate d data (ie mean group scores of the 64

units are used) This means that there are two variable s for each job charac-

teristic one variable with individual scores and one variable with aggre gated

individual scores The se aggre gate -leve l variable s combine judgments across

individual jobs thus removing variance due to individual differences and idi-

osyncratic re sponses In order to minimize bias the subjective indicators of

our two job characteristics contain items with a minimum of cognitive proc-

essing In other words these items are precise ly defined and are as neutral as

possible (cf Frese 1989 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1987 Wall et al 1996)

Job dem ands were me asured by an eight-item questionnaire (5-point

response scale ranging from 1 = never to 5 = always) This scale was de-

ve loped by De Jonge Lande wee rd and Nijhuis (1993) and is extensive ly

validate d in Dutch samples We used a relative ly wide range of both quali-

tative and quantitative demanding aspects like working under pressure of

time job comple xity working hard and strenuous work The reliability of

this scale (Cronbachrsquos a ) is 85 An example of the items is ldquoIn the unit

where I work work is carrie d out under pressure of timerdquo

102 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

that some aspe cts are difficult to e xpress in concre te physical te rms (Warr

1987) For e xample job autonomy and job clarity do not provide usable

ge neral marke rs The second approach seems to be objective as me ntioned

above but may be influenced by observersrsquo bias The measurement yie lds

incomple te and partially invalid information due to limited observation

time or space and the e ffects of the observation itse lf (Fre se amp Z apf 1988)

Additionally obse rve rsrsquo ratings see m to suffer from stronge r halo and

stereotyping effects than subjectsrsquo assessments (Frese 1985 Semmer Zapf

amp Gre if 1996 Spector Brannick amp Coove rt 1989)

The subjective method is usually carried out by means of se lf-report

questionnaire s This kind of me asureme nt has several problems as we ll

(e g Frese 1985 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1989 1996 Spector 1992

Zapf 1989) such as (1) conceptual overlap betwe en indepe ndent and de-

pendent me asures in that both me asures reflect the same construct (2)

common me thod variance because the information is derive d from the

same source (eg central tendency acquiescence) (3) influence of a third

variable that causes a spurious re lationship (eg a pe rsonal trait) (4) the

potential influencemdashor alterationmdashof the e stimation of job characteristics

due to the presence of an outcome variable (e g health complaints) (5)

possible e ffect of demand characte ristics of the re search context and e x-

perimenter e ffects re sulting in false correlations betwe en job characteristics

and outcome variable s (6) job incumbents may be so used to the ir work

situation that they deny some of the occupational hazards

Spector (1992) argued that more work nee ds to be done e xploring the

accuracy of reports both from the perspective of the job incumbent and

from alte rnative sources to reflect the work conditions O ne way to avoid

the above -me ntioned problems as far as possible is to look for such alte r-

native sources So-calle d group assessm ents seem to be ve ry useful in meas-

uring job characte ristics (Frese 1985 1989 Fre se amp Zapf 1988 Spector

1992) By group assessments we mean that the scores of job incumbents

with the same job and working in ne arly identical workplaces are aggre -

gate d into one ge neral score The group assessments can be described as

the group e stimate s of the re spective job characte ristic for each job incum-

bent These me asures re fe r to that part of a particular job characteristic

that different workers doing ne arly the same job have in common (see also

Semme r e t al 1996) In other words group asse ssments are base d on the

concept of the ideal typical worker ( ie an ave rage worker with sufficient

skills to perform his or he r tasks) According to Fre se and Zapf (1988

1994) group assessments are more objective measures in the sense that

the influence of idiosyncraticmdashindividualmdashperceptions and possibly illusory

answers are reduced In addition to this the e xpertise of workers is taken

into account and problems of brie f pe riods of observation are avoide d Fi-

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 99

nally group assessments see m to be less subject to methodological prob-

le ms such as attenuation because unsystematic error variance is reduced

Thus group data are likely to be more reliable than individual assessme nts

Theoretical justification for considering group assessments as more ob-

je ctive me asures of the two job characte ristics in the JD-C Model can be

found in the literature on social and inte ractional psychology industrial

and organizational psychology and organizational behaviour and e cology

(eg Alderfer 1987 Baron amp Boudreau 1987 Gibson 1979 Hackman

1976 Kraheacute 1992 Schneide r 1987 Warr 1987) From the point of view

of modern interactionism for instance there e xists situational features that

can be consensually regarde d as part of the situation These features are

conceptualized as situational ldquoaffordance srdquo and are constructs that imply

the complimentarity of both work e nvironments and workers What makes

the features ldquoquasi-objectiverdquo is the fact that they be long to the work situ-

ation irrespective of whe the r or not the job incumbent recognizes them as

such For e xample a danger signal te lls a majority of workers to run to

the e me rge ncy e xit Affordance s have some conce ptual similarity with

Hackman rsquos (1976) ldquogroup-supplied stimulirdquoAnother justification is provide d by Schne ide rrsquos (1987) ASA frame-

work This framework sugge sts that employe es will expe rience similar work-

ing conditions due to attraction se lection and attrition processes in an

organization This re sults in similarity in behaviour within a work se tting

In othe r words the pe ople make the workplace (Schneide r 1987) Al-

though Schneider bases his framework primarily at the organizational leve l

it is most likely that his ideas can be e mployed at the group le ve l of analysis

The claim that group assessment ( ie aggre gated data) is more ob-

je ctive is corroborate d by se ve ral e mpirical findings For instance a

me taanalysis of 16 conve rge nce studie s conducte d by Spe ctor (1992)

showe d that aggre gate -leve l corre lations betwee n job characte ristics and

outcome s were similar to individual le ve l correlations Moreover it ap-

peared that the converge nt validity at the aggre gate d le ve l was rather large

and e ven large r than at the individual leve l

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to test the JD-C Model using both group

and individual indicators of job characteristics The reason why we used

group and individual assessments of job demands and job autonomy is that

we want to find out whether aggre gated job characte ristics data significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics data with regard to

employee he alth In othe r words the key question is whether aggre gated

job characteristics e xplain additional variance in individualsrsquo attitudinal re-

100 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

actions This could mean that some of the explained variance of employe e

health is attributable to some more objective features outside the individual

pe rce ption or asse ssme nt (e g affordance s or group-supplie d stimuli)

which has important theoretical and practical conseque nces For instance

if job-relate d strain captures group le ve l variance the aspirations of the

JD -C Model to be situation-centered would rece ive support In addition

to all this we tried to measure the two job characte ristics (job demands

and job autonomy) more precise ly and e xte nsive ly Lastly the inte raction

effect of demands and autonomy was tested with regre ssion techniques in-

cluding a multiplicative interaction term (cf Aiken amp West 1991 Jaccard

Turrisi amp Wan 1990 Landsbergis et al 1994)

We tested the JD-C Model in a single -occupation sample of health care

workers because the ir professions are ve ry suitable for testing the JD-C

Model for several reasons (e g Fox Dwye r amp Ganster 1993 Ganster amp

Fusilier 1989) First health care workers seem to be subject to stressful work

conditions (ie high job demands) Second job autonomy is an important

tool in present-day care de livery systems Third because of different types of

health care areas and different specialties he alth care workers are a re lative ly

hete rogeneous group Moreover Ganster and Fusilie r (1989) showed that

there is as much variability in health care sample s as there is across a fairly

wide range of occupations Finally the relative homogeneity in social class

restricts the confounding e ffect of socioeconomic status

In line with the JD-C Model it is hypothesized that job demands and

job autonomy have an interaction effect with respect to e mployee he alth

To be more specific we e xpe ct that job autonomy attenuates the adve rse

effects of job demands on employe e health In addition to this we will

compare aggre gated and individual data by means of the variance to be

explaine d We e xpect that give n that aggre gated data correspond to the

more objective work conditions then if the JD-C Model is correct the

use of aggre gated data should reve al stronger interaction e ffects

METHOD

Sam ple

A random sample of 16 institutions was drawn from all gene ral hos-

pitals and nursing home s in the Netherlands (N = 218) Eight general hos-

pitals and e ight nursing home s participated in the study He alth care

workers in four units in each institute we re asked to comple te a que stion-

naire Six types of units were present in the sample an intensive care unit

(ICU) a psychiatric unit an inte rnal unit a surgical unit a somatic unit

and finally a psychogeriatric unit The initial sample consisted of 1806

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 101

health care workers from 64 units including nurses nursesrsquo aide s student

nurses activity therapists secretarie s and kitchen staff Self-report ques-

tionnaire s were fille d in and 1489 responde nts returne d the completed

que stionnaire by post (82 response ) In order to keep the work situation

roughly constant across individuals within a give n unit we only included

health care workers with the same job leve l name ly registe red nurses (cf

Thomas 1986) Furthermore only workers who had bee n e mployed for

more than 3 months we re included in the final sample in order to e nsure

valid and reliable observations of the work situation (cf Frese amp Zapf

1994 Katz 1978) These two restrictions reduce the sample to 895 regis-

te red nurses E ighty-four percent of the re spondents were wome n and the

age ranged from 19 to 59 years (M = 307 SD = 74) The me an work

expe rience was 108 years (SD = 65)

Measures

Dem ograph ic variables ( ie gende r and age ) functioned as control vari-

ables These variable s may confound the relationships betwe e n job charac-

te ristics and outcome variable s (e g Karase k amp Theorell 1990 Schaufeli

amp Van Die rendonck 1993 Warr 1987) Be cause type of un it may also play

a confounding role we controlle d for this variable too

Job demands and job autonom y are the predictor variable s In accordance

with the theoretical background we have tried to operationalize these con-

structs more precise ly and more comple te ly There fore these two measures

differ somewhat from Karase krsquos measures The two job characteristics include

both individual data and aggre gate d data (ie mean group scores of the 64

units are used) This means that there are two variable s for each job charac-

teristic one variable with individual scores and one variable with aggre gated

individual scores The se aggre gate -leve l variable s combine judgments across

individual jobs thus removing variance due to individual differences and idi-

osyncratic re sponses In order to minimize bias the subjective indicators of

our two job characteristics contain items with a minimum of cognitive proc-

essing In other words these items are precise ly defined and are as neutral as

possible (cf Frese 1989 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1987 Wall et al 1996)

Job dem ands were me asured by an eight-item questionnaire (5-point

response scale ranging from 1 = never to 5 = always) This scale was de-

ve loped by De Jonge Lande wee rd and Nijhuis (1993) and is extensive ly

validate d in Dutch samples We used a relative ly wide range of both quali-

tative and quantitative demanding aspects like working under pressure of

time job comple xity working hard and strenuous work The reliability of

this scale (Cronbachrsquos a ) is 85 An example of the items is ldquoIn the unit

where I work work is carrie d out under pressure of timerdquo

102 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

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ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

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BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

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Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

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FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

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1990 75(2) 107-116

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HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

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HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

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HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

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JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

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JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

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validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

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KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

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KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

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KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

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tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

nally group assessments see m to be less subject to methodological prob-

le ms such as attenuation because unsystematic error variance is reduced

Thus group data are likely to be more reliable than individual assessme nts

Theoretical justification for considering group assessments as more ob-

je ctive me asures of the two job characte ristics in the JD-C Model can be

found in the literature on social and inte ractional psychology industrial

and organizational psychology and organizational behaviour and e cology

(eg Alderfer 1987 Baron amp Boudreau 1987 Gibson 1979 Hackman

1976 Kraheacute 1992 Schneide r 1987 Warr 1987) From the point of view

of modern interactionism for instance there e xists situational features that

can be consensually regarde d as part of the situation These features are

conceptualized as situational ldquoaffordance srdquo and are constructs that imply

the complimentarity of both work e nvironments and workers What makes

the features ldquoquasi-objectiverdquo is the fact that they be long to the work situ-

ation irrespective of whe the r or not the job incumbent recognizes them as

such For e xample a danger signal te lls a majority of workers to run to

the e me rge ncy e xit Affordance s have some conce ptual similarity with

Hackman rsquos (1976) ldquogroup-supplied stimulirdquoAnother justification is provide d by Schne ide rrsquos (1987) ASA frame-

work This framework sugge sts that employe es will expe rience similar work-

ing conditions due to attraction se lection and attrition processes in an

organization This re sults in similarity in behaviour within a work se tting

In othe r words the pe ople make the workplace (Schneide r 1987) Al-

though Schneider bases his framework primarily at the organizational leve l

it is most likely that his ideas can be e mployed at the group le ve l of analysis

The claim that group assessment ( ie aggre gated data) is more ob-

je ctive is corroborate d by se ve ral e mpirical findings For instance a

me taanalysis of 16 conve rge nce studie s conducte d by Spe ctor (1992)

showe d that aggre gate -leve l corre lations betwee n job characte ristics and

outcome s were similar to individual le ve l correlations Moreover it ap-

peared that the converge nt validity at the aggre gate d le ve l was rather large

and e ven large r than at the individual leve l

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to test the JD-C Model using both group

and individual indicators of job characteristics The reason why we used

group and individual assessments of job demands and job autonomy is that

we want to find out whether aggre gated job characte ristics data significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics data with regard to

employee he alth In othe r words the key question is whether aggre gated

job characteristics e xplain additional variance in individualsrsquo attitudinal re-

100 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

actions This could mean that some of the explained variance of employe e

health is attributable to some more objective features outside the individual

pe rce ption or asse ssme nt (e g affordance s or group-supplie d stimuli)

which has important theoretical and practical conseque nces For instance

if job-relate d strain captures group le ve l variance the aspirations of the

JD -C Model to be situation-centered would rece ive support In addition

to all this we tried to measure the two job characte ristics (job demands

and job autonomy) more precise ly and e xte nsive ly Lastly the inte raction

effect of demands and autonomy was tested with regre ssion techniques in-

cluding a multiplicative interaction term (cf Aiken amp West 1991 Jaccard

Turrisi amp Wan 1990 Landsbergis et al 1994)

We tested the JD-C Model in a single -occupation sample of health care

workers because the ir professions are ve ry suitable for testing the JD-C

Model for several reasons (e g Fox Dwye r amp Ganster 1993 Ganster amp

Fusilier 1989) First health care workers seem to be subject to stressful work

conditions (ie high job demands) Second job autonomy is an important

tool in present-day care de livery systems Third because of different types of

health care areas and different specialties he alth care workers are a re lative ly

hete rogeneous group Moreover Ganster and Fusilie r (1989) showed that

there is as much variability in health care sample s as there is across a fairly

wide range of occupations Finally the relative homogeneity in social class

restricts the confounding e ffect of socioeconomic status

In line with the JD-C Model it is hypothesized that job demands and

job autonomy have an interaction effect with respect to e mployee he alth

To be more specific we e xpe ct that job autonomy attenuates the adve rse

effects of job demands on employe e health In addition to this we will

compare aggre gated and individual data by means of the variance to be

explaine d We e xpect that give n that aggre gated data correspond to the

more objective work conditions then if the JD-C Model is correct the

use of aggre gated data should reve al stronger interaction e ffects

METHOD

Sam ple

A random sample of 16 institutions was drawn from all gene ral hos-

pitals and nursing home s in the Netherlands (N = 218) Eight general hos-

pitals and e ight nursing home s participated in the study He alth care

workers in four units in each institute we re asked to comple te a que stion-

naire Six types of units were present in the sample an intensive care unit

(ICU) a psychiatric unit an inte rnal unit a surgical unit a somatic unit

and finally a psychogeriatric unit The initial sample consisted of 1806

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 101

health care workers from 64 units including nurses nursesrsquo aide s student

nurses activity therapists secretarie s and kitchen staff Self-report ques-

tionnaire s were fille d in and 1489 responde nts returne d the completed

que stionnaire by post (82 response ) In order to keep the work situation

roughly constant across individuals within a give n unit we only included

health care workers with the same job leve l name ly registe red nurses (cf

Thomas 1986) Furthermore only workers who had bee n e mployed for

more than 3 months we re included in the final sample in order to e nsure

valid and reliable observations of the work situation (cf Frese amp Zapf

1994 Katz 1978) These two restrictions reduce the sample to 895 regis-

te red nurses E ighty-four percent of the re spondents were wome n and the

age ranged from 19 to 59 years (M = 307 SD = 74) The me an work

expe rience was 108 years (SD = 65)

Measures

Dem ograph ic variables ( ie gende r and age ) functioned as control vari-

ables These variable s may confound the relationships betwe e n job charac-

te ristics and outcome variable s (e g Karase k amp Theorell 1990 Schaufeli

amp Van Die rendonck 1993 Warr 1987) Be cause type of un it may also play

a confounding role we controlle d for this variable too

Job demands and job autonom y are the predictor variable s In accordance

with the theoretical background we have tried to operationalize these con-

structs more precise ly and more comple te ly There fore these two measures

differ somewhat from Karase krsquos measures The two job characteristics include

both individual data and aggre gate d data (ie mean group scores of the 64

units are used) This means that there are two variable s for each job charac-

teristic one variable with individual scores and one variable with aggre gated

individual scores The se aggre gate -leve l variable s combine judgments across

individual jobs thus removing variance due to individual differences and idi-

osyncratic re sponses In order to minimize bias the subjective indicators of

our two job characteristics contain items with a minimum of cognitive proc-

essing In other words these items are precise ly defined and are as neutral as

possible (cf Frese 1989 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1987 Wall et al 1996)

Job dem ands were me asured by an eight-item questionnaire (5-point

response scale ranging from 1 = never to 5 = always) This scale was de-

ve loped by De Jonge Lande wee rd and Nijhuis (1993) and is extensive ly

validate d in Dutch samples We used a relative ly wide range of both quali-

tative and quantitative demanding aspects like working under pressure of

time job comple xity working hard and strenuous work The reliability of

this scale (Cronbachrsquos a ) is 85 An example of the items is ldquoIn the unit

where I work work is carrie d out under pressure of timerdquo

102 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

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ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

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BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

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Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

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HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

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JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

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agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

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validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

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KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

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KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

actions This could mean that some of the explained variance of employe e

health is attributable to some more objective features outside the individual

pe rce ption or asse ssme nt (e g affordance s or group-supplie d stimuli)

which has important theoretical and practical conseque nces For instance

if job-relate d strain captures group le ve l variance the aspirations of the

JD -C Model to be situation-centered would rece ive support In addition

to all this we tried to measure the two job characte ristics (job demands

and job autonomy) more precise ly and e xte nsive ly Lastly the inte raction

effect of demands and autonomy was tested with regre ssion techniques in-

cluding a multiplicative interaction term (cf Aiken amp West 1991 Jaccard

Turrisi amp Wan 1990 Landsbergis et al 1994)

We tested the JD-C Model in a single -occupation sample of health care

workers because the ir professions are ve ry suitable for testing the JD-C

Model for several reasons (e g Fox Dwye r amp Ganster 1993 Ganster amp

Fusilier 1989) First health care workers seem to be subject to stressful work

conditions (ie high job demands) Second job autonomy is an important

tool in present-day care de livery systems Third because of different types of

health care areas and different specialties he alth care workers are a re lative ly

hete rogeneous group Moreover Ganster and Fusilie r (1989) showed that

there is as much variability in health care sample s as there is across a fairly

wide range of occupations Finally the relative homogeneity in social class

restricts the confounding e ffect of socioeconomic status

In line with the JD-C Model it is hypothesized that job demands and

job autonomy have an interaction effect with respect to e mployee he alth

To be more specific we e xpe ct that job autonomy attenuates the adve rse

effects of job demands on employe e health In addition to this we will

compare aggre gated and individual data by means of the variance to be

explaine d We e xpect that give n that aggre gated data correspond to the

more objective work conditions then if the JD-C Model is correct the

use of aggre gated data should reve al stronger interaction e ffects

METHOD

Sam ple

A random sample of 16 institutions was drawn from all gene ral hos-

pitals and nursing home s in the Netherlands (N = 218) Eight general hos-

pitals and e ight nursing home s participated in the study He alth care

workers in four units in each institute we re asked to comple te a que stion-

naire Six types of units were present in the sample an intensive care unit

(ICU) a psychiatric unit an inte rnal unit a surgical unit a somatic unit

and finally a psychogeriatric unit The initial sample consisted of 1806

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 101

health care workers from 64 units including nurses nursesrsquo aide s student

nurses activity therapists secretarie s and kitchen staff Self-report ques-

tionnaire s were fille d in and 1489 responde nts returne d the completed

que stionnaire by post (82 response ) In order to keep the work situation

roughly constant across individuals within a give n unit we only included

health care workers with the same job leve l name ly registe red nurses (cf

Thomas 1986) Furthermore only workers who had bee n e mployed for

more than 3 months we re included in the final sample in order to e nsure

valid and reliable observations of the work situation (cf Frese amp Zapf

1994 Katz 1978) These two restrictions reduce the sample to 895 regis-

te red nurses E ighty-four percent of the re spondents were wome n and the

age ranged from 19 to 59 years (M = 307 SD = 74) The me an work

expe rience was 108 years (SD = 65)

Measures

Dem ograph ic variables ( ie gende r and age ) functioned as control vari-

ables These variable s may confound the relationships betwe e n job charac-

te ristics and outcome variable s (e g Karase k amp Theorell 1990 Schaufeli

amp Van Die rendonck 1993 Warr 1987) Be cause type of un it may also play

a confounding role we controlle d for this variable too

Job demands and job autonom y are the predictor variable s In accordance

with the theoretical background we have tried to operationalize these con-

structs more precise ly and more comple te ly There fore these two measures

differ somewhat from Karase krsquos measures The two job characteristics include

both individual data and aggre gate d data (ie mean group scores of the 64

units are used) This means that there are two variable s for each job charac-

teristic one variable with individual scores and one variable with aggre gated

individual scores The se aggre gate -leve l variable s combine judgments across

individual jobs thus removing variance due to individual differences and idi-

osyncratic re sponses In order to minimize bias the subjective indicators of

our two job characteristics contain items with a minimum of cognitive proc-

essing In other words these items are precise ly defined and are as neutral as

possible (cf Frese 1989 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1987 Wall et al 1996)

Job dem ands were me asured by an eight-item questionnaire (5-point

response scale ranging from 1 = never to 5 = always) This scale was de-

ve loped by De Jonge Lande wee rd and Nijhuis (1993) and is extensive ly

validate d in Dutch samples We used a relative ly wide range of both quali-

tative and quantitative demanding aspects like working under pressure of

time job comple xity working hard and strenuous work The reliability of

this scale (Cronbachrsquos a ) is 85 An example of the items is ldquoIn the unit

where I work work is carrie d out under pressure of timerdquo

102 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

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AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

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ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

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BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

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317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

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FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

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GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

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HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

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HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

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JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

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JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

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validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

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KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

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KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

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Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

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tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

health care workers from 64 units including nurses nursesrsquo aide s student

nurses activity therapists secretarie s and kitchen staff Self-report ques-

tionnaire s were fille d in and 1489 responde nts returne d the completed

que stionnaire by post (82 response ) In order to keep the work situation

roughly constant across individuals within a give n unit we only included

health care workers with the same job leve l name ly registe red nurses (cf

Thomas 1986) Furthermore only workers who had bee n e mployed for

more than 3 months we re included in the final sample in order to e nsure

valid and reliable observations of the work situation (cf Frese amp Zapf

1994 Katz 1978) These two restrictions reduce the sample to 895 regis-

te red nurses E ighty-four percent of the re spondents were wome n and the

age ranged from 19 to 59 years (M = 307 SD = 74) The me an work

expe rience was 108 years (SD = 65)

Measures

Dem ograph ic variables ( ie gende r and age ) functioned as control vari-

ables These variable s may confound the relationships betwe e n job charac-

te ristics and outcome variable s (e g Karase k amp Theorell 1990 Schaufeli

amp Van Die rendonck 1993 Warr 1987) Be cause type of un it may also play

a confounding role we controlle d for this variable too

Job demands and job autonom y are the predictor variable s In accordance

with the theoretical background we have tried to operationalize these con-

structs more precise ly and more comple te ly There fore these two measures

differ somewhat from Karase krsquos measures The two job characteristics include

both individual data and aggre gate d data (ie mean group scores of the 64

units are used) This means that there are two variable s for each job charac-

teristic one variable with individual scores and one variable with aggre gated

individual scores The se aggre gate -leve l variable s combine judgments across

individual jobs thus removing variance due to individual differences and idi-

osyncratic re sponses In order to minimize bias the subjective indicators of

our two job characteristics contain items with a minimum of cognitive proc-

essing In other words these items are precise ly defined and are as neutral as

possible (cf Frese 1989 Frese amp Z apf 1988 Kasl 1987 Wall et al 1996)

Job dem ands were me asured by an eight-item questionnaire (5-point

response scale ranging from 1 = never to 5 = always) This scale was de-

ve loped by De Jonge Lande wee rd and Nijhuis (1993) and is extensive ly

validate d in Dutch samples We used a relative ly wide range of both quali-

tative and quantitative demanding aspects like working under pressure of

time job comple xity working hard and strenuous work The reliability of

this scale (Cronbachrsquos a ) is 85 An example of the items is ldquoIn the unit

where I work work is carrie d out under pressure of timerdquo

102 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

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ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

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BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

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317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

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FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

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FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

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FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

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1990 75(2) 107-116

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HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

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HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

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Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

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JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

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JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

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heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

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KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

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KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

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Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

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dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

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KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

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tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job auton om y was measured by means of the Maastricht Autonomy Ques-

tionnaire (MAQ De Jonge 1995) which consists of ten Likert items with a

5-point response scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much The MAQ

measures the workerrsquos opportunity (or freedom) inherent in the job to deter-

mine a varie ty of task dimensions like method of working amount of work

and work goals The reliability of the MAQ is 81 For instance ldquoThe oppor-

tunity that the work offers to determine the method of working yourselfrdquoIn line with the two major predictions of the JD-C Model we used

four outcome variable s ( ie em otional exhaustion job-related an xiety work

m otivation and job satisfaction)

Em otional exhau stion is a compone nt of the Dutch ve rsion of the

Maslach Burnout Inve ntory the MBI-NL (Schaufe li amp Van Dierendonck

1993 1994) Of the three dimensions of burnout emotional exhaustion is

close st to more traditional strain variable s (cf Maslach 1993 Shirom

1989) The scale consists of e ight items scored on a 7-point scale (ranging

from 0 = ne ve r to 6 = always a = 85)

Job-related an xiety was me asure d by me ans of a compone nt of the

D u tc h O r gan iz a tiona l S tre ss Q ue st ionna ir e ( V O S Re ic he amp Va n

Dijkhuizen 1979) asking respondents how the y ge nerally fe lt at work The

scale consists of four items with a response scale ranging from 1 = never

to 4 = always ( a = 78) The items reflect feelings of anxie ty ne rvousness

tenseness and restlessness re spe ctive ly

Work m otivation was measured by five items in which the respondents

were aske d how inte resting stimulating and challenging the ir work was

(De Jonge et al 1993) The questions we re answered on a 5-point scale

(response scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagre e to 5 = fully agre e)

The re liability of this scale is 87 This scale has bee n we ll-validate d in

Dutch samples of health care workers (cf De Jonge 1995)

Job satisfaction was measured by one item ldquoI am satisfied with my present

jobrdquo The question was answered on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly

disagree to 5 = fully agree Several researchers have shown that a global rating

of overall job satisfaction is an inclusive me asure of ove rall job satisfaction

(e g Scarpello amp Campbell 1983 Wanous Reichers amp Hudy 1997)

Data Analys is

Much behavioural and social research involve s hie rarchical data struc-

ture s Conventional statistical techniques (e g ordinary regre ssion analysis)

ignore this hie rarchy and may there fore le ad to incorrect re sults (Bryk amp

Raudenbush 1992 Hox 1994 Hox amp Kreft 1994)

In the multi-occupation studies regarding the JD-C Model for e xam-

ple occupational grouping was used as a measure of objective differences

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 103

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

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tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

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MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

betwe e n jobs re le vant to job rede sign (e g Karase k amp The ore ll 1990

Schwartz Pieper amp Karase k 1988) Although this me thod appears to be

a slight improve me nt on the use of observe rsrsquo ratings it is still very con-

servative and too indirect to isolate the two job characteristics (Fre se amp

Zapf 1988 Ganster amp Schaubroeck 1991 Kasl 1989) More specifically

information is lost if data are aggre gate d to mean group scores There is

a gre at deal of imprecision as a re sult of the inability to deal with variability

in job characte ristics within the group (Ganster amp Fusilier 1989 Landsber-

gis Schurman Israel Schnall Hugentobler Cahill amp Baker 1993) Con-

sequently the statistical analysis may lose power (Hox 1994)

Furthe rmore conve ntional statistical techniques le an heavily on the as-

sumption of inde pendence of observations A common problem with the se

techniques is that the statistical dependence among the scores of employe es

within the same group (due to group characteristics not included in the

mode l) is discounted All observations are regarded as independent when

in fact the re is de pe nde nce (Hox 1994 Vancouver Millsap amp Peters

1994) Violation of the assumption of indepe ndence of observations may

cause too small e stimates of the standard errors of conventional statistical

techniques (Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) This negative bias in turn may

le ad to spurious ldquosignificantrdquo findings

A final problem is that in small groups the group ave rages will have

large standard e rrors Conventional statistical analysis using group means

will be unusable to separate systematic variation from sampling error (Van-

couve r et al 1994)

Recent deve lopments in statistical theory with regard to the estimation

of hierarchical linear models allow us to take the hierarchy in data into

account (Aitkin amp Longford 1986) In this so-called ldquomultileve l re searchrdquothe data structure in the population is hie rarchical and the data are viewed

as a multistage sample from this hierarchical population For e xample in

organizational re search the population consists of organizations units or

groups within these organizations and e mploye e s within these units or

groups With the he lp of multileve l models we can formulate and test hy-

potheses about relationships occurring at different leve ls and e ven across

le ve ls In the present study a three-leve l model is used (cf Bryk amp Raude n-

bush 1992 Chap 8) First the macrole ve l contains a random sample of

16 institutions Second there are 64 units at the mesoleve l Finally the re

are 895 nurses assumed to be randomly sampled pe r unit (microleve l)

The basic hie rarchical regre ssion mode l for a three-leve l datase t can

be formulate d as a general regre ssion equation with a dependent variable

y and independent variable s x1 to xh in which the subscript i re fe rs to the

microle ve l (nurse) j to the mesoleve l (unit) and k to the macrole ve l ( in-

stitution see Eq 1)

104 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

yijk = b 0jk + b 1jkx1ijk + b 2jkx2ijk + + b hjkxhijk + eijk (1)

The subscript h indexe s the indepe ndent variable x and the corresponding

regre ssion parame ter b Equation (1) is the general microleve l mode l In

the multileve l model the intercept ( b 0jk) and regre ssion coefficients ( b s)

of microle ve l predictors (such as ge nde r age and job demands) may vary

across mesoleve l units (units) and across macroleve l units ( institutions)

randomly andor as a linear function of a me sole ve l or macroleve l fixe d

factor (see Bryk amp Raudenbush 1992) In our mode l we assume that the

intercept ( b 0jk) from Eq (1) can be rewritten as presented in Eq (2)

(2)

in which z1 to z5 represent the dummy variable s for type of unit (me soleve l

fixe d factors) u0jk the random effect of the factor unit within type of unit

and v0k the random effect of the factor institution In this way differences

in health and well-being betwe en units and institutions are accommodated

Because of the exploratory nature of this study explicit hypothe se s

about the interaction betwe en our predictor variable s on the one hand

and the random factors unit and institution on the other (so-called cross-

le ve l effects) we re absent There fore we restricted our analyse s to random

variation betwe en units and institutions in the intercept ( b 0jk) only which

represents random (main) e ffects of the factors unit and institution The

other regression coefficients ( b 1 to b h) are assume d to be constant across

units and institutions which implie s noninteraction betwee n fixe d factors

(xs) and random factors (unit and institution)

This results in a multileve l mode l in which individuals are the unit of

analysis and in which the intercept b 0jk may vary at two le ve ls units and

institutions Additionally some me soleve l and macroleve l fixe d factors can

be introduce d to e xplain variability For our purpose we only included

mesole ve l fixed factors that is the two aggre gate d job characteristics and

the ir interaction term

Take n together multileve l analysis has several advantages in compari-

son with conve ntional statistical techniques First data from more than one

hierarchical le ve l can be included in the analysis So with respect to the

JD -C Model we are able to e stimate the relative importance of individual

and group leve l factors Second the statistical dependence betwe e n indi-

viduals of the same unit (or units of the same institution) is taken into

account through the random variation of szlig0jk across units and institutions

Finally the multileve l model separate s sampling error due to variation be-

twe en units from variation within units

b b0 01

5

0 0 0jkq

q q jk ky z u v= + + +=aring

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 105

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

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Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

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GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

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GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

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HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

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HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

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HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

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JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

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JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

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port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

In this study the multileve l mode ls are estimate d and fitted with the

computer program VARCL (VARiance Component analysis by maximum

L ikelihood Longford 1993) VARCL is one of the most popular computer

programs for analyzing multileve l regression models (cf Hox 1994 Kreft

De Leeuw amp Van der Lee den 1994) Additionally a standard statistical pro-

gram (SPSS) was used in order to obtain the two raw data file s with aggre -

gated and individual data respectively to be used in VARCL (cf Hox 1994)

Mod el Bu ild in g

The strategy for mode l building within VARCL is to follow the hy-

pothesis and expe ctations as described e arlier

1 The first model that is fitted is an e mpty mode l a fully uncondi-

tional mode l without predictors at any leve l apart from the ran-

dom effects of units and institutions This model represents the

(unexplained) variation of the outcome variable s at e ach le ve l

(nurse unit and institution) In case of significant unit and insti-

tution effects we will have to perform multileve l analyse s rather

than ordinary line ar regression analyse s

2 The second model includes all covariate s ( ie gender age and

type of unit) and the individual job characteristics How much of

the total variance can be e xplaine d by these variable s

3 The third mode l again includes the variable s of mode l 2 but now

the aggre gate d job characte ristics are adde d The questions are

first whe ther the aggre gated variable s add explained variance to

model 2 and second how much variance can be explained by both

individual and aggre gate d variable s

In order to test the interaction hypothe sis we performed multileve l

regre ssion analyse s including a multiplicative inte raction term for all out-

come variable s The multiplicative te rm was computed from the grand

mean centered scores of job demands and job autonomy for the individual

variable s and aggre gate d variable s re spective ly (cf Aiken amp We st 1991

Kleinbaum Kupper amp Muller 1988)

RESULTS

Prelim inary An alyses

The means standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations

of the study variable s are presented in Table I Note that there are two

covariate s at the microle ve l ( ie gende r and age ) and five dummy variable s

106 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

lati

on

so

fth

eS

tud

yV

ari

ab

les

(n=

89

5)

Va

ria

ble

MS

D1

23

45

67

89

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

1G

en

de

ra

macrmacr

2A

ge

30

70

73

6macr1

4

3In

div

d

em

3

20

56

09

macr0

6

4In

div

a

ut

27

25

5macr1

3

08

macr3

0

5In

div

d

xab

macr09

34

00

macr03

macr07

0

1

6A

gg

rd

em

3

21

32

20

macr0

8

56

macr2

5

macr02

7A

gg

ra

uto

2

69

28

macr20

0

8

macr30

4

8

macr04

macr52

8A

gg

rd

xab

macr04

10

12

macr0

7

01

macr13

3

3

02

macr26

9S

ati

sfa

ctio

n3

90

86

09

macr0

7

macr18

1

3

11

macr1

5

09

1

5

10

Mo

tiva

tio

n3

80

68

macr01

macr10

macr0

9

20

1

0

macr18

1

8

07

4

9

11

Ex

ha

ust

ion

17

48

7macr0

2macr0

24

5

macr13

macr0

52

5

macr08

macr0

9

macr42

macr2

1

12

An

xie

ty1

47

43

macr04

macr01

19

macr0

1macr0

61

0

04

macr11

macr2

5

macr11

4

8

13

Psy

chia

tric

macrmacr

macr26

1

8

macr16

1

9

macr06

macr28

4

1

macr27

macr1

7

macr04

10

1

6

14

Inte

rna

lmacr

macr1

3

macr06

03

08

0

8

06

16

1

4

06

06

macr02

00

macr14

15

Su

rgic

al

macrmacr

10

macr0

30

7

macr02

06

12

macr0

41

5

macr00

06

06

01

macr14

macr1

3

16

So

ma

tic

macrmacr

15

macr0

8

20

macr2

2

macr11

3

5

macr46

macr1

5

macr05

macr13

0

2macr0

4macr2

1

macr20

macr1

9

17

Psy

cho

-ge

rmacr

macr1

5

macr08

macr0

0macr0

60

1macr0

1macr1

3

09

0

5macr1

0

01

macr06

macr21

macr2

0

macr19

macr2

8

aG

en

de

rw

as

cod

ed

0(m

ale

s)a

nd

1(f

em

ale

s)

bG

ran

dm

ea

nce

nte

red

p

lt0

5(t

wo

-ta

ile

d)

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

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validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

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MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Ta

ble

IM

ea

ns

Sta

nd

ard

De

via

tio

ns

an

dZ

ero

-Ord

er

Pe

ars

on

Co

rre

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(n=

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45

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10

11

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14

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macr03

macr07

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macr2

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Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 107

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

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Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

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FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

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GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

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GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

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GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

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HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

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agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

at the me soleve l controlling for the six types of units The Intensive Care

Unit (ICU) is the reference cate gory and has the value 0 on all five dummy

variable s At the me soleve l the predictor variable s job demands and job

autonomy consist of aggre gate d individual data (ie me an group score per

unit was computed cf Hox 1994)

To justify aggre gation of the two job characteristics we have to demon-

strate sufficient homogene ity of within-unit variance To test whe ther there

was agree me nt within the 64 units of the ratings of job demands and job

autonomy we used the estimate of within-group interrate r reliability of James

Demaree and Wolf (1993) This coefficient can be interpreted similarly to

other types of reliability coefficients such as coefficient alpha (cf George

1990) In general the ave rage within-group interrater reliability for job de-

mands and job autonomy was 95 and 96 respectively In summary the reli-

ability estimate s for the two job characteristics indicate d a high leve l of

agreement within units justifying the use of aggre gates in subsequent analyse s

Finally a confirmatory factor analysis (LISRE L 8) was conducted to

show that indeed there are four separate outcome variable s (cf Joumlreskog

amp Soumlrbom 1993) The corresponding LISREL analysis showe d that a four-

factor solution yie lde d an acceptable chi-square re lative to its degrees of

freedom ( c 2(129) = 51339 p lt 001) and relative ly good other fit indices

(NNFI = 93 CFI = 94 AGFI = 91 RMSEA = 06)

Mod el Tests

The first mode l within VARCL is an e mpty model with only one fixed

effect name ly the intercept (the ave rage individual me an) and two random

effects of the factors units and institutions Significance of the random e ffects

of units and institutions within VARCL was te sted by computing the deviance

(D) for the ordinary regre ssion model (a regression model without these ran-

dom effects) The difference between this deviance and the deviance of our

multileve l null model has a c 2-distribution with two de gree s of freedom under

H0 such that the re are ne ithe r unit nor institution effects (e g Bryk amp

Raude nbush 1992 Kleinbaum e t al 1988) For all outcome variable s the

results showed that the difference betwe en the two deviances is significant

which me ans that H0 was reje cted We may conclude that there are differ-

ences betwe en units andor institutions with re spect to all outcome variable s

The variance in these variable s is mainly a function of individual differences

(857 macr944 ) but unit and institution differences together explain some of

the variance (56 macr143 ) So multileve l regression analyse s rather than or-

dinary regre ssion analyse s have to be performed

108 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Em otion al Exhau stion

The results of the multileve l regression analyse s with e motional e xhaus-

tion as outcome variable are give n in Table II In the second mode l of Table

II all e ight covariate s and the two individual job characteristics are entered

Different models can be compare d with respect to predictive power by

a likelihood ratio te st (Bosker amp Snijders 1990 Bryk amp Raude nbush 1992)

De viance (D) is computed for each model and the difference betwe en the

deviance statistics ( D D) is used to test the hypothese s If one model is a spe-

cial reduced version of the other model this difference has a c 2-distribution

under H0 that the exte nded model does not predict be tter than the reduced

mode l Critical values of the c 2-statistic mean that the reduced model is too

simple a description of the data (eg Kle inbaum et al 1988)

Table II Results of the Multileve l Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

E motional Exhaustion (p-Values Based on Approximate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 176 176 178

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr10 macr09

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 73 71

Job autonomy macr04 macr04

Dem acute aut macr02 01

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 55 52

Internal 12 11

Surgical 24 23

Som atic 06 macr01

Psycho-ge riatric 20 17

Job demands 10

Job autonomy macr07

Dem acute aut macr65

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 680 561 560

Group level 071 011 010

Institution level 013 002 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 225630 204054 203599

D mode l 1 ( D D) 21576

D mode l 2 ( D D) 455

D df 10 3

R2 249 254

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 109

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

After e ntering the above -me ntioned variable s the ove rall model fit im-

proved ( D D(10) = 21576 p lt 05) This implie s that mode l 2 has a better

fit than mode l 1 and reduces unexplained variance at all three le ve ls The

total mode led or explained proportion of variance (R2) is 249 For a

random intercept mode l this parameter can be e stimate d as the propor-

tional reduction in me an squared prediction e rror due to predictor variable s

(see also Snijders amp Bosker 1994)

It appears howe ver that the inte raction term of job demands and job

autonomy is not significant O nly individual job demands have a significant

positive relationship with e motional exhaustion In other words highe r le v-

els of individual job de mands are associate d with higher leve ls of e motional

exhaustion

In our next mode l aggre gate d variable s are entered in order to explain

differences in emotional e xhaustion Moreover model 3 e xamines whether

aggre gated job characte ristics add variance to model 2 Table II shows that

this model does not have a better fit than model 2 ( D D(3) = 455 p =

ns) indicating that the effects of the aggre gate d variable s are modest The

total mode led variance is 254

Job-Related An xiety

Table III presents the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with

job-related anxie ty as outcome variable Model 2 contains the re sults for

the covariate s and the individual job characteristics Entering the se vari-

ables improved model fit ( D D(10) = 6303 p lt 05) and reduced some

unexplained variance at the individual and group le ve l (mode lle d variance

85 ) The table indicate s that the interaction term of job demands and

job autonomy is not significant Similar to e motional exhaustion mode l 2

shows that the individual job demands have a significant positive association

with anxie ty That is highe r le ve ls of individual job de mands are re lated

to highe r leve ls of job-relate d anxie ty

The aggre gated variable s we re entered in the next mode l (model 3)

Compare d with mode l 2 model 3 does not le ad to an improveme nt in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 607 p = ns) This means that the remaining unex-

plaine d variance in model 2 cannot be explained by the aggre gate d job

characte ristics The total mode le d variance in mode l 3 is 91

Work Motivation

The results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s with work motivation

are presented in Table IV Entering the covariates and individual variable s

in mode l 2 improve d mode l fit ( D D(10) = 5891 p lt 05) So the se vari-

110 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

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ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

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BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

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Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

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GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

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HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

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HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

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HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

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JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

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JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

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validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

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KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

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KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

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KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

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tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

ables contribute significantly to the explanation of work motivation at all

three leve ls the entire mode le d variance is 106

Model 3 provide s a significant improve ment in mode l fit compare d

with model 2 ( D D(3) = 1171 p lt 05) The aggre gated variable s are able

to e xplain some variance that cannot be e xplaine d by the individual vari-

ables The total modele d variance is 128 Finally this mode l shows a

significant positive interaction effect at the individual leve l Added to this

the aggre gated job demands have a significant negative relationship with

work motivation In othe r words higher le ve ls of aggre gate d job demands

are associate d with lower leve ls of work motivation

The technique for examining the interaction betwe en job demands and

job autonomy is plotting the e quations (cf Aiken amp We st 1991) Following

Table III Results of the Multile vel Regression Analyse s with Respe ct to

Job Re late d Anxiety (p-V alues Based on Approxim ate Standard Errors

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 147 154 155

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r macr01 macr01

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands 18 15

Job autonomy 01 00

Dem acute aut macr05 macr03

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric 23 22

Internal 00 macr01

Surgical 00 macr01

Som atic macr06 macr09

Psycho-ge riatric macr04 macr05

Job demands 10

Job autonomy 01

Dem acute aut macr28

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 178 173 172

Group level 011 000 000

Institution level 000 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 103160 96857 96250

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6303

D mode l 2 ( D D) 607

D df 10 3

R2 86 91

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 111

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

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BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

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HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

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JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

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JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

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KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

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KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

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Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

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KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

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KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

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KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

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KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

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349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

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tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

the method of Cohen and Cohen (1983) value s of the predictor variable s

were chosen one standard deviation below and above the me an Simple

regre ssion lines were then generate d by entering these value s in the re-

gre ssion e quation The results of the computations of these simple regre s-

sion equations are give n in Fig 1

The interaction term at individual le ve l with regard to work motiva-

tion shows that job demands and work motivation are slightly positive ly

re lated at high le ve ls of autonomy At the same time howeve r de mands

and motivation are slightly ne gative ly associate d in the case of low leve ls

of autonomy

Table IV Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyses with Respe ct to

W ork Motivation ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pproxim ate Standa rd E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 377 431 425

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 10 10

Age macr01 macr01

Job demands 02 07

Job autonomy 21 20

Dem acute aut 14 13

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr31 macr32

Internal macr20 macr16

Surgical macr16 macr08

Som atic macr40 macr24

Psycho-ge riatric macr41 macr34

Job demands macr31

Job autonomy 19

Dem acute aut 36

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 403 386 385

Group level 046 034 025

Institution level 021 000 000

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 179680 173789 172618

D mode l 1 ( D D) 5891

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1171

D df 10 3

R2 106 128

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

112 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

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AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

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317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

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CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

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FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

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FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

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FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

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JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

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JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

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validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

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KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

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KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

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tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

Job Satisfaction

Finally Table V shows the results of the multileve l regre ssion analyse s

with job satisfaction First the model fit improved significantly whe n the

covariate s and individual variable s are e ntered in the model ( D D(10) =

6112 p lt 05) The modeled variance is 104 Next model 3 includes

the three aggre gate d variable s and shows a significant improve ment in

mode l fit ( D D(3) = 1214 p lt 05) Mode l 3 reduced unexplaine d variance

particularly at group and institution leve l the total e xplained variance is

132 Lastly this mode l shows a significant positive interaction effect at

the group leve l Job demands and job autonomy at individual le ve l have a

significant negative and positive association with job satisfaction respec-

tive ly That is higher leve ls of individual job demands are relate d to lower

le ve ls of job satisfaction Conve rse ly highe r le ve ls of job autonomy are as-

sociated with highe r leve ls of job satisfaction

Figure 2 shows the graphical representation of the interaction betwe en

job demands and job autonomy at group le ve l with regard to job satisfaction

It appears that job de mands and job satisfaction are positive ly associated in

the case of high leve ls of job autonomy At low le ve ls of job autonomy how-

ever job demands and job satisfaction are ne gative ly relate d

In multileve l literature our aggre gate d variable s are considered to be

contextual effects (Bosker amp Snijde rs 1991 Raudenbush 1989) The classic

formulation of a contextual effect model involve s a regression e quation in-

cluding both the individual variable (s) and the group variable (s) Howe ver

Fig 1 Graphical re pre sentation of the individual level inte raction among

job demands and job autonom y in the pre diction of work motivation

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 113

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

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ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

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BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

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317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

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CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

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FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

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Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

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FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

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organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

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118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

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GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

such a model might suffer from high colline arity leading to poor precision

in model fit (Aitkin amp Longford 1986)

O ur mode ls 3 (Tables IImacrV ) are such contextual e ffect models To test

whether the mode ls are subject to high colline arity we carrie d out ordinary

regre ssion analyse s of mode l 3 with all four outcome variable s Collinearity

was checked by means of the Variance Inflation Factor (V IF) A rule of

thumb for evaluating V IFs is that one should be concerned about any value

larger than 100 (Kleinbaum e t al 1988) The V IFs in our analyse s did

not e xcee d 33 which indicates that no seve re collinearity problems are to

be expe cted All in all it can be concluded that our contextual e ffect models

do not suffer from high collinearity

Table V Results of the Multilevel Regression Analyse s with Re spe ct to

Job Satisfaction ( p -V alue s B ase d on A pp ro ximate Standar d E rro rs

Provide d by V ARCL)

Mode l

1 2 3

Grand me an ( b 0) 388 396 393

Individual leve lb

Ge nde r 23 22

Age macr00 macr00

Job demands macr22 macr18

Job autonomy 16 15

Dem acute aut 15 12

Group levelb

Type of unita

Psychiatric macr54 macr53

Internal macr05 macr05

Surgical macr15 macr09

Som atic macr17 04

Psycho-ge riatric macr12 macr03

Job demands macr22

Job autonomy 35

Dem acute aut 112

V ariance decomposition ( s e2)

Individual leve l 628 604 602

Group level 085 035 028

Institution level 024 021 010

Mode l fit

Deviance (D) 219732 213620 212406

D mode l 1 ( D D) 6112

D mode l 2 ( D D) 1214

D df 10 3

R2 104 132

aReference category ICU

bUnstandard ized regression coefficients

p lt 05

114 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

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Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

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BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

DISCUSSION

The present study contributes to job redesign and job stress re search

by testing the Job Demand-Control Model using a multileve l analytic ap-

proach To be more specific we used both aggre gate d individual data and

individual data as indicators of the job characteristics job demands and job

autonomy In our vie w the aggre gate d data correspond to the more ob-

je ctive work conditions while the individual data correspond to stressor

perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes In interpre ting the findings

of this study it is important to consider not only the confirmation of the

hypothesis and the answe rs on the questions but also the ir re lative signifi-

cance We will brie fly discuss them

First the re sults partly support the interaction hypothesis of the JD-C

Model by finding two interaction effects and both in the expe cted direc-

tion The significant interaction terms represent 25 of the inte ractions

te sted which me ans no strong support for the JD-C Model The support

for the mode l is quite meaningful however because one significant strong

interaction was found at the aggre gate d (ie group) leve l This finding un-

derlines the position of the JD -C Mode l as a situation-centered mode l with

the interplay of two more objective job characteristics

In contrast no significant interaction e ffects were found for the ad-

verse health outcomes Although the interaction terms were in the right

direction the le ve l of 5 significance just could not be reached (p-values

were about 06 and 07) An e xplanation for this unexpected result may be

some lack of power in this kind of outcome variable s and in detecting

interactions at all (cf Aiken amp West 1991)

Fig 2 Graphical re pre sentation of the group level interaction among job de-

mands and job autonom y in the pre diction of job satisfaction

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 115

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

The modeled variance (R2) for the best fitting mode ls range d from

9 for job-relate d anxie ty to 25 for emotional exhaustion Adde d to this

the job characte ristics account for a higher amount of reduced variance in

adve rse he alth outcome s (e xhaustion 9 and anxie ty 5 ) than in the

two other variable s ( ie about 2 for both motivation and satisfaction)

Although these values are not very high they are rather consistent with

those obtaine d by othe r high quality occupational stress studie s ( e g

Karase k 1989 Semme r et al 1996 Warr 1990)

Se cond an important question was whether aggre gated job charac-

te ristics data significantly add explained variance to individual job charac-

te ristics data with respect to employe e health Though the percentages are

not ve ry high the findings indicate that aggre gated job characte ristics data

are important in e xplaining work motivation and job satisfaction and are

able to e xplain some variance that could not be e xplaine d by the individual

data (about 2macr3 ) From the standpoint of me asureme nt one can argue

that there are things which can be me asured be tter by aggre gated leve l

characte ristics This remarkable point has also bee n noted by Z apf (1989)

For instance job incumbents may be so used to their work situation in

such a way that the y de ny some of the occupational hazards In other

words group le ve l characte ristics may tap (a part of) the context in which

individual workers operate These re sults legitimate the claim of the JD-C

Model to be a environme ntal-oriented model as far as work motivation

and job satisfaction are concerned

Conversely the aggre gated job characteristics we re not important in

explaining emotional e xhaustion and job-related anxie ty while addressing

the individual leve l job characteristics Moreove r they did not significantly

add explained variance to individual job characteristics An e xplanation may

be that emotional e xhaustion and job-relate d anxie ty are for the most part

de termine d by stressor perceptions or re sults of appraisal processes (cf

Lazarus 1995) Another explanation may be that other factors (e g social

cues me thod variance ) must be acknowle dged as potential sources (cf

Spector 1992) So base d upon these findings Karasekrsquos JD -C Model seems

to be not only situation-centered but also contains some person-centered

assumptions In summary the current findings sugge st that work motivation

and job satisfaction are more dependent on the group (ie the ave rage

worker) while emotional exhaustion and to a le sser e xtent anxie ty are

more de pendent on the individual

An intere sting e xplanation for the group leve l and individual le ve l e f-

fects may be that both group and individual assessment (partly) reflect the

same features of the work situation which were re fe rred to as affordances

(see introduction) Affordances see m to be important for all workers be-

cause they can be regarded as be ing part of the situation Another the o-

116 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

retical rationale for these e ffects has been provided by an intergroup theory

(cf Alderfer 1987 Schneider 1985) The logic of this theory is that inter-

actions of employe es at any le ve l of analysis represent the e ffects of group

memberships In its most expande d form this perspective emphasizes the

embedded nature of subsystems In othe r words eve ry person can be em-

bedded in a group (an employee in a unit) e very group can be e mbedded

in other groups (a unit in an organization) and so on Applie d to our study

employee health might be a product of multileve l embeddedness of job

characte ristics That is the individual le ve l of analysis is embedded in and

affected by at least the ne xt leve l of analysis So it see ms that the next

larger unit(s) in which individual job characteristics are embedded will also

have an impact at least on work motivation and job satisfaction

All in all the present study supports the choice of the JD-C Model in

job redesign research as well as job stress research It can be concluded that

perceptions of job characteristics do not only reflect subjective feelings but

also are grounded in some kind of e nvironmental reality as far as job satis-

faction and work motivation are concerned Assuming that aggre gated job

characteristics data are more re lated to the objective work e nvironment than

individual data these results suggest a rede sign of work conditions for the

sake of job satisfaction and work motivation and a change of the individual

worker for the sake of e motional exhaustion and job-related anxie ty

Some we aknesses of the present study can be mentioned First we tried

to de fine nearly identical jobs in order to me et the criterion of the same work

situations However our method of sample restriction (ie 895 registered

nurses left) probably le d to a reduction in variance Despite the fact that our

procedure was variance reducing we did find some evide nce for the interac-

tive JD-C Model Second as noted before aggre gated data are more re liable

than individual data and thus le ss affected by attenuation However aggre -

gated data will have this benefit only in case of high unsystematic e rror vari-

ance In case of low error variance ldquorealrdquo differences between individuals

within units will be ignored using the method of aggre gation Third our pre-

sent multileve l analysis is not totally free of problems For e xample it can

only be applied to each outcome variable separately and conseque ntly ig-

nores relationships betwee n them Multivariate e xtensions like multileve l

structural equation mode ling are needed (e g Hox 1994 McArdle amp Ham-

agam i 1996 Mutheacuten 1994) Fourth we used an exploratory procedure to

derive a parsimonious model So there is a possibility that some decisions

we have made are based on chance The current findings have to be cross-

validated with another large and hierarchical sample Finally it is not possible

to dete rmine whether the assumed causal paths are present on the basis of

our cross-sectional data Although JD-C theory guided our hypothesis about

causal relationships hypothesized causal connections should be interpreted

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 117

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

carefully For this purpose longitudinal studies are required (cf Zapf Dor-

mann amp Fre se 1996)

In conclusion this study shows that both group and individual asse ss-

ments of job characteristics are important in predicting e mployee he alth

Practically our re sults support the notion that researchers may nee d to

focus on work conditions ( ie the concept of the ideal typical worker) and

the individual e mployee simultaneously Furthermore the results imply that

previous individual leve l re search should be supple mented by a considera-

tion of aggre gated le ve l e ffects Further re search however is neede d for

a better understanding of the relationships that we re hypothesized and in-

vestigated and for refineme nts of techniques and measurements

REFERENCES

AIKEN L S amp WE ST S G Multiple regression Testing and interpreting interactions Ne wbury

Park CA Sage Publications 1991

AITKIN M amp LO NGFO RD N Statistical mode ling issue s in school e ffectiveness studie s

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1986 Series A 149 1-43

ALDERFE R C P An intergrou p perspe ctive on group dynamics In J Lorsch (Ed) Hand-

book of organ izational behavior Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1987 pp 190-222

BARO N R M amp BO UDREAU L A An ecological pe rspe ctive on inte grating personality

and social psychology Journal of Person ality and Social Psychology 1987 53 1222-1228

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Statistische aspe cten van multi-niveau onderzoe k

[Statistical aspe cts of multilevel research] Tijdschrift voor Onderwijsresearch 1990 15(5)

317-329

BO SKER R J amp SNIJDE RS T A B Ce nte r forward Unpublished manuscript 1991

BRYK A S amp RAUDENBUSH S W Hierarchical linear m odels Applications and data analy-

sis m ethods Ne wbury Park CA Sage Publications 1992

CO HEN J amp CO HE N P Applied m ultiple regressio ncorrelation analysis for the behavioral

sciences (2nd e d) Hillsdale Lawre nce E rlbaum Associate s 1983

FOX M L DWYER D J amp GANSTER D C E ffe cts of stre ssful job demands and control

on psychologic al and attitudinal outcome s in a hospital se tting Academy of Management

Journal 1993 36(2) 289-318

FRESE M Stre ss at work and psychosomat ic complaints A causal interpre tation Journ al of

Applied Psychology 1985 70(2) 314-328

FRESE M Theore tical mode ls of control and health In S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and

C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp

107-128

FRESE M amp Z APF D Methodologic al issues in the study of work stre ss O bjective vs

subje ctive me asurem ent of work stre ss and the que stion of longitudinal studie s In C L

Coope r and R Payne (Eds) Cau ses coping and consequences of stress at work Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1988 pp 375-411

FRESE M amp Z APF D Action as the core of work psychology A Ge rm an approach In

H C Triandis M D Dunne tte and L M Hough (E ds) Handbook of industrial and

organ izational psychology (Vol 4) Palo Alto CA Consultin g Psychologists Pre ss 1994

pp 271-340

GANSTE R D C Worke r control and well-being A re view of re search in the workplace In

S L Saute r J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 3-23

GANSTE R D C Inte rventions for building he althy organizations Sugge stions from the stre ss

rese arch literature In L R Murphy J J Hurre ll Jr S L Saute r and G P Keita

(Eds) Job stress interventions Washington APA 1995 pp 323-336

118 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

GANSTE R D C amp FUSILIE R M R Control in the workplace In C L Coope r and I

T Robertson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chich-

ester Wile y 1989 pp 235-280

GANSTE R D C amp SCH AUBRO ECK J Work stre ss and e mploye e health Journal of Man-

agem ent 1991 17(2) 235-271

GEO RGE J M Personality affect and be havior in groups Journal of Applied Psychology

1990 75(2) 107-116

GIBSO N J J The ecological approach to visual perception Boston Houghton Mifflin 1979

HACKMAN J R Group influence s on individuals In M D Dunne tte (E d) Handbook of

industrial and organ izational psychology Chicago Rand McNally 1976 pp 1455-1526

HACKMAN J R amp O LDHAM G R Work redesign Reading MA Addison-We sley Pub-

lishing Com pany 1980

HOX J J Applied m ultilevel analysis Amste rdam TT-Publikatie s 1994

HOX J J amp KREFT I G G Multilevel analysis methods Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 283-299

JACCARD J TURRISI R amp WANN C K Interaction effects in m ultiple regression New-

bury Park CA Sage Publications 1990

JAMES L R DEMAREE R G amp WO LF G rwg An asse ssm ent of within-group interrate r

agree ment Journal of Applied Psychology 1993 78(2) 306-309

JOHNSO N J V Control colle ctivity and the psychosocial work e nvironm ent In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 56-74

JONES F amp FLE TCHER B(C) Job control and health In M J Schabracq J A M

Winnubst and C L Coope r (Eds) Handbook of work and health psychology Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1996 pp 33-50

JONGE J DE Job autonomy we ll-being and he alth A study among Dutch health care

worke rs PhD thesis University of Limburg Maastricht 1995

JONGE J DE amp KO MPIER M A J A critical e xamination of the Demand-Con trol-Sup-

port Mode l from a work psychological pe rspe ctive International Journal of Stress Man-

agem ent 1997 4(4) 235-258

JONGE J DE LANDEWEERD J A amp NIJHUIS F J N Constructie e n valide ring van

de vragenlijst te n behoe ve van he t proje ct ldquoautonomie in het werkrdquo [Constructio n and

validation of the que stionnaire for the ldquojob autonomy proje ctrdquo] Studies bedrijfsgezond-

heidszorg num m er 9 Maastricht Unive rsity of Limburg 1993

JOumlRESKO G K G amp SOumlRBO M D LISREL 8 Userrsquos reference guide Chicago Scientific

Software Inte rnational 1993

KAHN R L amp BYOSIE RE P Stre ss in organizations In M D Dune tte and L M Hough

(Eds) Handbook of industrial and organ izational psychology (Vol 3) Palo Alto CA Con-

sulting Psychologists Press 1992 pp 571-650

KARASEK R A Jr Job demands job decision latitude and me ntal strain Implications for

job design Adm inistrative Science Quarterly 1979 24 285-308

KARASEK R A Job content instru m ent Questionnaire and userrsquos guide revision 11 Los An-

ge les Unive rsity of Southe rn California 1985

KARASEK R Control in the workplace and its he alth-re lated aspe cts In S L Saute r J J

Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster Wile y

amp Sons 1989 pp 129-159

KARASEK R A amp THEO RELL T Healthy work Stress productivity and the recon stru ction

of working life New York Basic Books 1990

KASL S V Methodologie s in stre ss and he alth Past difficulties pre sent dilemmas future

dire ctions In S V Kasl and C L Coope r (Eds) Stress and health Issu es in research

m ethodology Chiche ster John Wiley amp Sons 1987 pp 307-318

KASL S V An e pidemiological perspe ctive on the role of control in he alth In S L Saute r

J J Hurre ll Jr and C L Coope r (Eds) Job control and worker health Chiche ster

Wile y amp Sons 1989 pp 161-189

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 119

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

KASL S V The influence of the work environm ent on cardiovascular health A historical

conceptual and me thodologic al perspe ctive Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

1996 1(1) 42-56

KATZ R Job longevity as a situational factor in job satisfaction Adm inistrative Science Quar-

terly 1978 23 204-223

KLEINBAUM D G KUPPER L L amp MULLE R K E Applied regressio n analysis and

other m ultivariable m ethods (2nd e d) Boston PWS-KE NT Publishing Com pany 1988

KRAHEacute B Person ality and social psychology Towards a synthesis Ne wbury Park CA Sage

Publications 1992

KREFT I G G LEEUW J DE amp LEE DEN R VAN DER Review of five multilevel

analysis program s BMDP-5V GENMO D HLM ML3 VARCL The Am erican Statisti-

cian 1994 48(4) 324-335

KRISTE NSE N T S The demand-con trol-support mode l Methodological challenges for fu-

ture research Stress Medicine 1995 11 17-26

L A ND SB E R G IS P A S CH NA L L P L WA R R E N K P IC KE R ING T G amp

SCH WARTZ J E Association between ambulatory blood pre ssure and alte rnative for-

mulations of job strain Scandinavian Journal of Work Environm en t amp Health 1994 20

349-363

LANDSB ERGIS P A SCHU RMAN S J ISRAEL B A SCH NALL P L HUGEN-

TO BLER M K CAHILL J amp BAKE R D Job stre ss and he art disease Evidence

and strate gie s for pre vention New Solutions 1993 Summe r 42-58

LAZ ARUS R S Psychological stre ss in the workplace In R Crandall amp P L Perre weacute(Eds) Occupational stress A handbook Washington Taylor amp Francis 1995 pp 3-14

LO NGFO RD N T VARCL Software for variance com ponent analysis of data with nested ran-

dom effects (m axim um likelihood) Groninge n ie c ProGAMMA 1993

MASLACH C Burnout A multidim ensional perspe ctive In W B Schaufe li C Maslach amp

T Marek (Eds) Profession al burnout recent developm ents in theory and research Ne w

York Taylor amp Francis 1993 pp 19-32

McARDLE J J amp HAMAGAMI F Multile vel models from a multiple group structural

equation perspe ctive In G A Marcoulide s and R E Schumacke r (Eds) Advanced stru c-

tural equation m odeling Issu es and techn iques Mahwah NJ Lawre nce Erlbaum Associ-

ates 1996 pp 89-124

MUTHEacuteN B O Multileve l covariance structure analysis Sociological Methods amp Research

1994 22(3) 376-398

PARKES K Locus of control as moderator An e xplanation for additive versus interactive

findings in the demand-discre tion mode l of work stress British Journal of Psychology

1991 82 291-312

PAYNE R amp FLETCHE R B(C) Job demands supports and constraints as pre dictors of

psychologica l strain among schoolteache rs Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983 22 136-

147

RAUDENBUSH S ldquoCe nte ringrdquo pre dictors in multile vel analysis Choice s and conse que nce s

Multilevel m odelling newsletter 1989 12 10-12

REICHE H M J K I amp DIJKHU IZ EN N VAN Vragen lijst organ isatie stress Test-han-

dleiding [O rganizational stre ss que stionnaire Test-m anual] Nijmege n Unive rsity of Ni-

jmege n 1979

RIJK A E DE BLANC P M LE SCHAUFE LI W B amp JONGE J DE Active coping

and nee d for control as moderators of the Job De mand-Control Mode l Effects on burn-

out Journal of Occupation al and Organizational Psychology 1998 71 1-18

SCARPE LLO V amp CAMPBELL J P Job satisfaction Are all the parts there Personnel

Psychology 1983 36 577-600

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIERENDO NCK D VAN The construct validity of two burnout

me asure s Journal of Organizational Behavior 1993 14 631-647

SCHAUFE LI W B amp DIE RE NDO NCK D VAN Burnout een begrip ge meten De Ne d-

erlandse ve rsie van de Maslach Burnout Inve ntory [Burnout the me asurem ent of a con-

struct The Dutch ve rsion of the Maslach Burnout Inve ntory] G edrag en G ezondheid

1994 22(4) 153-172

120 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

SCHNALL P L LANDSB ERGIS P A amp BAKER D Job strain and cardiovascular dis-

ease Annual Review of Public Health 1994 15 381-411

SCHNEID ER B O rganizational be havior Annual Review of Psychology 1985 36 573-611

SCHNEID ER B The people make the place Person nel Psychology 1987 40 437-453

SCHWARTZ J E PIE PER C F amp KARASEK R A A proce dure for linking psychosocial

job characte ristics data to health surve ys Am erican Journal of Public Health 1988 78(8)

904-909

SEMME R N Z APF D amp GREIF S ldquoShare d job strainrdquo A ne w approach for asse ssing

the validity of job stre ss me asure ments Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 293-310

SHIR O M A Burnout in work organizations In C L Coope r and I T Robertson (Eds)

International review of industrial and organ izational psychology Chiche ster John Wile y amp

Sons 1989 pp 25-48

SIE GRIST J PETE R R JUNGE A CREME R P amp SEIDE L D Low status control

high e ffort at work and ischemic he art dise ase Prospe ctive evidence from blue -collar

me n Social Science and Medicine 1990 31(10) 1127-1134

SNIJDE RS T A B amp BO SKER R J Mode led variance in two-le vel models Sociological

Methods amp Research 1994 22(3) 342-363

SOumlDERFELDT B SOumlDE RFELDT M JONES K O rsquoCAMPO P MUNTANE R C O HL-

SO N C G amp WARG L E Does organization matter A multilevel analysis of the

de mand-control mode l applied to human service s Social Science and Medicine 1997

44(4) 527-534

SPE CTOR P E Inte ractive e ffects of perce ived control and job stre ssors on affective reactions

and health outcome s for clerical worke rs Work and Stress 1987 1 155-162

SPE CTOR P E A conside ration of the validity and me aning of se lf-report measure s of job

conditions In C L Coope r and I T Robe rtson (E ds) International review of industrial

and organ izational psychology New York Wiley amp Sons 1992 pp 123-151

SPE CTOR P E BRANNICK M T amp CO OV ERT M D Job Analysis In C L Cooper

and I T Robe rtson (Eds) International review of industrial and organ izational psychology

Chiche ster Wiley amp Sons 1989 pp 281-328

THEO RELL T amp KARASEK R A Curre nt issues re lating to psychosocial job strain and

cardiovascular disease re search Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(1)

9-26

THO MAS J G Source s of social information A longitudinal analysis Hum an Relations 1986

39 855-870

VANCO UV ER J B MILLSA P R E amp PETERS P A Multile vel analysis of organizational

goal congrue nce Journal of Applied Psychology 1994 79(5) 666-679

WALL T D JACKSO N P R MULLARKEY S amp PARKER S K The demands-con trol

model of job strain A more spe cific test Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psy-

chology 1996 69 153-166

WANO US J P REICHE RS A E amp HUDY M J O ve rall job satisfaction How good are

single -item measure s Journal of Applied Psychology 1997 82(2) 247-252

WARR P Work unemploym ent and m ental health O xford Clare ndon Pre ss 1987

WARR P B Decision latitude job de mands and e mploye e we ll-being Work and Stress 1990

4(4) 285-294

Z APF D Selbst- und Frem dbeobachtung in der psychologischen Arb eitsanalyse Goumlttinge n

Hogre fe 1989

Z APF D DO RMANN C amp FRESE M Longitudinal studie s in organizational stress re-

search A review of the literature with reference to me thodologic al issues Journal of

Occupational Health Psychology 1996 1(2) 145-169

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

JAN DE JONGE is a Lecture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the Unive rsity of

Nijmegen His main interest is research in work and organizational psychology in particular

Group and In dividual Level As ses sm en ts of Job Ch aracteristics 121

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is

job characteristics employe e health and flexibilization of work In 1996 he obtaine d his PhD

Degree for a the sis on job autonomy we ll-being and health

GERARD J P VAN BRE UKELEN is a Lecture r in Methodology and Statistics at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

JAN A LANDEWEERD is a Senior Le cture r in Work and O rganizational Psychology at the

Maastricht University

FRANS J N NIJHU IS is since 1995 Profe ssor in Work and Health Psychology at the Maas-

tricht Unive rsity

122 de Jon ge van Breukelen Landeweerd and Nijhu is