Who Panics When They Think of Work?

Abstract

Work anxiety is a specific mental health problem that is often associated with sick leave and negative work perception. Until now, there has been hardly any evidence on the more general psychological characteristics of work-anxious people, i.e., in terms of life values, life satisfaction, work coping, and activity level. Learning more about these cognitive and behavioral characteristics is, however, of interest for preventive action. This present study investigates these characteristics in people with and without mental health problems and with and without work anxiety comparatively. A representative sample of 2131 persons from the German general population of working age (18-70 years old, considering that many people wish to continue work after official retirement at age 67) were investigated via an interview and self-rating questionnaire. People with work anxiety have more work participation problems in terms of unemployment (8-20% of work-anxious were presently unemployed vs. 3-10% of those without work anxiety) and sick leave (1.6-7.0 weeks in the past 12 months vs. 1.2-4.8 weeks) compared with people without work anxiety. People with work anxiety show specific patterns of negative ratings of work-associated life satisfaction (work and colleagues) and place increased value on power and the need for control. In non-work-related life domains (neighbors, friends, and environment), there are smaller satisfaction differences between people with and without work anxiety. In conclusion, work anxiety is a specific mental health problem that is associated with specific work-related participation and life satisfaction problems (partly different from people with general mental health problems). Work anxiety must be specifically assessed in order to enable preventive or interventive action.

Keywords: coping; life satisfaction; unemployment; values; work ability; work anxiety; work phobic anxiety; workplace phobia.