Coping with job insecurity

Abstract

If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. AbstractPurpose -The purpose of the present paper is to investigate how employees' coping (problem, emotion and avoidance focused coping) may affect the reactions to job insecurity. Because the coping investigated in the present study addresses the stressor in different ways, the authors expect different moderating effects depending on the type of coping, which results in three different hypotheses. Design/methodology/approach -A sample of 579 Swedish accountants was used to test these hypotheses via surveys. Findings -The findings support the authors' assumptions that emotion focused coping weakened the relation of job insecurity and some of the outcomes. Both avoidance and problem focused coping strengthened the relation between job insecurity and some of the outcomes. Research limitations/implications -As this study utilizes cross-sectional data and only one occupational group, it is important to test the relations using longitudinal data with different occupational groups in future research. Practical implications -From these results some practical conclusions can be drawn as to which coping forms might be more beneficial, which can be helpful for organizations in order to develop intervention programs. Originality/value -This study expanded the understanding of coping in the context of job insecurity by testing different forms of coping and including a variety of important outcomes of job insecurity.

Perceived Job Insecurity and Sustainable Wellbeing: Do Coping Strategies Help?

“…They verified that those in high uncertainty situation who used high emotional avoidance strategies reported more stress; however, neither problem focused coping nor emotional focused coping were found to moderate the influence of employment uncertainty on reported stress. In a more recent study Richter and colleagues [39] found avoidance coping to strengthen the relation between job insecurity and turnover intentions. Furthermore, in accord with the stress theory assumptions, they found that emotion-focused coping was beneficial in the relationship between job insecurity and job satisfaction and turnover intentions.…”

“…Following the psychology of sustainability perspective, professionals are responsible to investigate how people react to job insecurity in order to find the best ways they can cope with it. Indeed, so far, some authors have started to explore personal coping strategies as possible moderators in the job insecurity-employees reactions relations [39,62,65].…”

“…However, despite substantial literature has focused on the investigation of the consequences of job insecurity, the relations between job insecurity and some general wellbeing outcomes, such as general health [36] and life satisfaction [37], are still not clear and further studies are needed. Furthermore, since the results in the literature on the consequences of job insecurity are not convergent, it is important to identify potential factors, such as personal specific coping strategies [38,39], that may affect the negative relationship between job insecurity and wellbeing outcomes not related to work. Therefore, this paper addresses, from an original perspective, namely the psychology of sustainability, the specific issue of job insecurity in relation to people's self-related health and life satisfaction, understood as general outcomes of wellbeing, less considered by the scientific literature on job insecurity compared to work-related outcomes.…”

Job Insecurity and Subsequent Actual Turnover: Rumination as a Valid Explanation?

“…This theory states that the threat of a resource loss evokes stress reactions and attempts to protect the valued resources. Job insecurity, indicative of the threat to the job, may result in stress reactions and attempts to find solutions in the eventual case of job loss, which may be reflected in rumination about a possible job loss in the future (Hartley et al, 1991;Richter et al, 2013). Rumination can thus be conceived as an indicator of the intensification of the job insecurity experience.…”

The Mediating Effect of Problem-focused Coping on the Relationship between Job Insecurity and Impression Management

“…As a result of the activation of problem-focused coping caused by job insecurity, individuals would attempt to engage in impression management tactics (Lazarus & Folkman, 1980). This argument is based on findings in previous studies, which showed that problem-focused coping was associated with positive outcomes when the stressors were perceived as controlled (Ben-zur, 2009;Billings & Moos, 1981;Pinquart & Silbereisen, 2008;in Richter et al, 2013). This research uses Transactional Stress Theory to explain the relationship between job insecurity, problem-focused coping, and impression management (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984).…”