Work availability types and well-being in Germany – a latent class analysis among a nationally representative sample

Abstract

Employees who remain available for work outside regular work hours often experience strain and work-home conflicts. This study clusters employees in distinct availability types based on different aspects of unregulated extended work ability, which are contacting frequency, availability expectations and perceived legitimacy of availability. Moreover, we examined covariates of class membership and relationships with employees' well-being. We used data from 17,410 employees who took part in a representative survey of the German working population. Latent class analysis with double cross-validation revealed three availability types. Satisfaction with work-life balance was higher and internal work-home interference was lower in the "rarely available"-class than in the "legitimate available"-class and the "illegitimate available"-class. Members of the "illegitimate available"-class reported worse subjective health, more psychovegetative health complaints, and higher levels of exhaustion than members of the "legitimate available"-class and the "rarely available"-class. Several socio-demographic variables, job characteristics, and factors associated with boundary management predicted class membership. Overall, the study highlights the risks for employees' well-being associated with unregulated extended work availabilityparticularly when it is perceived as illegitimateand points towards implications on the individual, organisational, and political level that may help reduce and better manage extended work ability.

Examining generational differences as a moderator of extreme‐context perception and its impact on work alienation organizational outcomes: Implications for the workplace and remote work transformation

“…Past literature (e.g., Mahmoud, Hack‐Polay, Reisel, et al ., 2021) indicates that the perception of pandemic‐related changes is likely to vary across generations due to fundamentally different work‐related objectives and preferences. Moreover, Millennials and Generation Z could be more vigilant about threats to their work‐life balance than older generations (Brauner, Wöhrmann & Michel, 2021). These generational variations are likely to influence the manner in which individuals perceive COVID‐19 changes and how they respond to related circumstances.…”

Workaholism and quality of work-life: a psychosocial pathway to brain-drain syndrome

“…These factors are peculiar and interesting in the framework of workaholism and QWL, as individuals with a tendency to workaholism infamously work longer than their colleagues (Clark et al, 2016). Spillover theory is an intra-personal contagion event that happens across roles within the same person (Brauner et al, 2021). Therefore, role demands in the work domain increase and those roles transfer from work to family, social life and other related life aspects contributing to conflict of interest in those domains and the work domain (Zhang et al, 2021).…”

“…Spillover theory is an intra-personal contagion event that happens across roles within the same person (Brauner et al ., 2021). Therefore, role demands in the work domain increase and those roles transfer from work to family, social life and other related life aspects contributing to conflict of interest in those domains and the work domain (Zhang et al ., 2021).…”

Re‐drawing the line: Work‐home boundary management profiles and their dynamics during the pandemic

“…permeable) boundaries allow people to engage into different work and non‐work roles more easily (Hecht & Allen, 2009); accordingly, some previous studies have linked boundary integration to higher work engagement (Kossek et al, 2012; van Zoonen & Banghart, 2018). However, increased availability that is typical to telework is also known to contribute to strain experiences (Brauner et al, 2021). Research implies that boundary integration might relate to an increase in employee exhaustion due to the lack of recovery from work, while segmentation prevents such risks (Kinnunen et al, 2016; Wepfer et al, 2018).…”