The relationship between shift work and mental health among electronics workers in South Korea: A cross-sectional study

Abstract

ObjectiveTo determine the relationship between shift work and mental health, particularly insomnia, depression, and suicidal ideation, among electronics production workers.MethodsA survey was conducted with 14,226 workers from an electronics manufacturer in South Korea. After excluding 112 individuals with incomplete responses, 14,114 respondents were analyzed. As part of a larger project, we collected data on respondents’ general characteristics, work-related characteristics, and health status; however, in this study, we focused on the data related to shift work and mental health. Insomnia, depression, and suicidal ideation were set as dependent variables and working schedule as set as the independent variable. We performed multiple logistic regression analysis with daytime workers as the reference group. The model was adjusted for age, gender, body mass index, workplace, educational level, and marital status with or without children under 6 years of age.ResultsRelative to daytime workers, shift workers had 2.35, 1.23, and 1.17 greater odds of insomnia, depression, and suicidal ideation, respectively. Within the shift worker group, we found that the odds of depression and suicidal ideation increased dramatically when respondents had insomnia. The ORs for depression and suicidal ideation were 4.899 and 7.934, respectively.ConclusionsOur findings suggest that shift work is related to an increased risk of mental health problems in production workers, and the sleep disturbance related with shift work is a central mechanism for this relationship. Since these results suggest that proactive management of sleep problems might attenuate their detrimental effects on shift worker’s mental health.

Depressive Symptoms, Suicidal Ideation, and Mental Health Service Use of Industrial Workers: Evidence from Vietnam

“…Notably, our result indicated that one-third of our sample had suicidal ideation in the last two weeks, which was more than four times higher when compared with the rate of suicidal ideation in the general Vietnamese population (8.9%) [36]. This prevalence was significantly higher than that in other settings such as the United States (2.6%) [37] and Korea (2.8%) [38]. Prior literature revealed that industrial workers were particularly vulnerable populations to depression and other mental health disorders given their low education and income, highly repetitive work, and constrained social support [6,39].…”

The Association between Shift Work and Health-Related Productivity Loss due to Either Sickness Absence or Reduced Performance at Work: A Cross-Sectional Study of Korea

“…In addition, it is important to recognise that having children could be a moderating factor on the relationship between shift work and HRPL [ 10 ] and that, in East Asian cultures, primary responsibility is commonly placed on mothers. Thus, women might have experienced higher levels of work–family conflict from shift work [ 24 ].…”

The Relationship Between Workers’ Health and Night Shift Work in Food Franchise Industry in Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia

“…According to Kang et al, (2017), night work leads is known to disrupt the body's circadian rhythms, including the sleep-wake pattern. Most prominently, disrupted endogenous melatonin secretion can cause depression, anxiety, and sleep-wake cycle disorders (Rahman et al, 2010).…”

“…Shift work may also be associated with mental health (Kang et al, 2017). Although historically scientific literature on work and health has focused primarily on the occurrence of physical illnesses, in recent years the studies dealing with workers' mental health, or those linking physical and mental issues, have been increasing significantly (Sergio et al, 2017).…”