London, Dec 8 (PTI) Employees who feel they are treatedunfairly at work are more likely to take long-term sickleaves, a study has found.
Sickness absence is a major health concern fororganisations and important contributing factors are found inthe work environment.
For example, low job control and decision-makingopportunities have previously been shown to increase thelikelihood of sick leave.
A relatively new determinant of employee health is theirperception of fairness in the work place, known asorganisational justice, according to researchers from theUniversity of East Anglia in the UK and the StockholmUniversity in Sweden.
The study, published in BMC Public Health, focused on oneelement of this, called interactional justice, which relatesto the treatment of employees by managers.
Interactional justice itself can encompass informationaljustice - defined as receiving truthful and candid informationwith adequate justifications - and interpersonal justice,concerning respectful and dignified treatment by the manager.
Using data from more than 19,000 employees, theresearchers investigated the relationship betweeninterpersonal and informational justice and long and frequentsickness absence.
They also explored whether times of high uncertainty atwork, for example perceived job insecurity, had an effect onsick leave.
The team found that lower levels of justice at workrelate both to an increase in shorter, but more frequentsickness absence periods, and to an increased risk of longersickness absence episodes.
Also, higher levels of job insecurity turned out to be animportant predictor of long and frequent sickness absence.
"While shorter, but more frequent periods of sicknessabsence might be a chance for the individual to get relieffrom high levels of strain or stress, long-term sicknessabsence might be a sign of more serious health problems," saidConstanze Eib, from the University of East Anglia.
"Our results underline the need for fair and justtreatment of employees irrespective of perceived jobinsecurity in order to keep the workforce healthy and tominimise lost work days due to sickness absence," Eib said.
PTI SNE MHNSNE.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.