Work engagement and workers’ health, is there any connection in the social work in ukraine?

Abstract

Introduction

This study is a part of the bigger research project on the burnout syndrome risk and prevention factors [1,2,4].

Objectives

At the current phase we aimed to discover: 1- trends observed in sociodemographic profiles of Ukrainian social workers(SW) who respond to the online survey; 2- if there is any correlation between the SW work engagement(WE) and general health(H).

Methods

The survey is designed out of two questionnaires - Gallup Q12 Employee Engagement survey(Q12) and the 15-item Patient Health Questionnaire(PHQ-15). Questions on the socio-demographic status are included according to the study purpose [3,4]. SW ‘from the field’ in Ukraine included in the study group(SG). Other professionals (doctors, lawyers, etc.) formed the comparison group(CG). Descriptive statistics applied for the data analyses.

Results

Our sample has the next socio-demographic characteristics: age 20-57 (average 33.2) years old, male/female ratio is 0.36; single at the moment of the study are 66.7%. The SG: women-87.5%, married-62.5%, social work experience -from 1 to 15years. In 28.6% of the CG respondents the Q12 revealed low(less than 50%) WE while in the SW no one showed low WE. PHQ-15: in the SG -62.5% mild and 12.5% -severe somatic problems; in the CG -57.1% mild and 28.6% -severe somatic symptoms. There were no statistically significant differences between 2 groups with regard to WE and H (p<0.05). Relations between variables are non-linear; therefore,Spearman’s coefficient (ρ) applied.

Conclusions

The weak association between the work engagement and health condition (ρ=0.3;p<0.05) is found. There are several limitations due to the sample specificity (online users in Ukraine).This study is ongoing.