What Is Occupational Health Psychology?

Occupational Health Psychology (OHP) has gradually emerged and grown. OHP uses the theoretical principles and research methods of psychology and combines related branches of psychology with close links with public health, occupational medicine, sociology, management, economics, law, ergonomics and other disciplines to create a safe and healthy To serve the professional environment and improve the quality of work of the practitioners.

Germination period (early 20th century-1970s)

Occupational health psychology, as an interdisciplinary discipline, can be traced back to the research conducted by industrial and organizational psychology and human factor psychology in the early 20th century. For example, during the First World War, the British Industrial Fatigue Research Committee's investigation of the effects of fatigue on working hours, job design, etc. could be regarded as a model for the initial research.

In the 1930s and 1940s, Mayo and others discovered through Hawthorne experiments that the increasing stylization and task skills brought about by the industrial revolution and scientific management laws threatened the health of employees and organizations. Based on the research, Mayo et al. Proposed the "interpersonal relationship" management theory. From today's perspective, the series of studies that make up the Hawthorne experiment can all be considered as the domain of occupational health psychology research. By the 1950s and 1960s, driven by a lot of research, more and more organizational theorists began to focus on the impact of work and organization on employees. These concerns quickly became an international social movement that focused the interest of government, labor departments, and managers in organizations on the satisfaction and health of the workforce. The research in this period opened the prelude to occupational health psychology and provided a rich source of evidence.

Formation period (1970s to present)

In 1970, the U.S. Congress passed the Occupational Safety and Health Action Case, which was designed "to the greatest extent possible to ensure that every man and woman at work is in a safe and healthy working environment." Under the action plan, the United States established the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), which is affiliated with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In particular, the action case specifically required NIOSH to include the psychology of occupational safety and health in its research activities. At this point, occupational health psychology has really received widespread attention. In the 1980s, NIOSH surveyed and listed the top 10 occupational health risk factors, including work-related psychological injuries, distress and disorders. In order to achieve the same work goals, NIOSH and the A-merican Psychological Association (APA) have conducted a lot of cooperation, which has played a strong role in promoting the formation and development of occupational health psychology. The cooperation between the two is manifested in the following four aspects [2]: holding a series of international, multi-disciplinary conferences; publishing a large number of papers and books on related topics; promoting post-doctoral training programs in the field of occupational health psychology; The Journal of Occupation-al Health Psychology was formally published in 1996. It was also at a national conference in 1990 that NIOSH and APA clearly defined the concept of occupational health psychology as a discipline in the United States. As a result, occupational health psychology was officially formed and began to develop rapidly in the United States.

Occupational diseases and injuries are very serious public health problems in the United States. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 3.3 million employees are treated for occupational injuries each year, and more than 500 employees die from injuries at work. Occupational health psychology is based on this background. Sauter et al. Believe that there are three main reasons for bringing psychology into the field of occupational safety and health: the increase and confirmation of stress-related psychological disorders as occupational health issues; and the recognition of psychosocial factors in occupational safety and health issues The gradual acceptance of the role played in the work; many recent changes in work organization that have led to work stress and health and safety issues. It should be said that people's recognition of the role of work organization in the mental health and growth of employees contributed to the creation of occupational health psychology.

If only from the perspective of humanistic care, the above reasons can already form the cornerstone of occupational health psychology. However, in the United States, another motivation for the formation of occupational health psychology is the cost-benefit analysis of employee health care. The impact of occupational injuries can be estimated using cost-benefit. For example, sick leave due to stress or other risk factors in the work organization, compensation provided by employees, premature death, etc. will bring quantifiable cost losses to the organization. With the application of occupational health psychology in a work organization, these costs can be significantly reduced.

It is not difficult to see from the goals of occupational health psychology that work organization is its core research object. Organizations are now generally understood as a complex dynamical system that occurs between individuals and groups. In actual research, researchers have distinguished three research dimensions about organization: work envi-ronment, individual, and work-family interface.

working environment

The health of the work environment can be affected by many factors. At present, researchers have distinguished the influencing factors including: the inherent attributes and environment of work, such as workload, rhythm, degree of control, physical environment, etc .; related to the organizational role of individuals, such as role conflicts, role ambiguity, etc .; and individuals Related to career development, such as job development potential; related to individual work relations, such as social support, participatory management, etc .; organizational attributes, such as intra-organizational communication, organizational culture, organizational structure, etc.

individual

Many characteristics of an individual also affect the health of the organizational environment, such as the stage of career development, age, individual health, self-dependence, and so on. In occupational health psychology research, specific individual-level research variables include mood, anger, work aholism, and gender differences. Such as anger often places individuals in psychological, interpersonal, and medical disorders. At work, anger turns into violence, with psychological, physical, and organizationally disruptive effects. Similarly, workaholicism can have a negative impact on the organization

Work-family interaction

The definition of work is too restrictive and needs to be expanded to include all productive activities that take place in paid and unpaid labor. In this way, not only can people better understand the differences between men and women in the work stress they are subjected to, but they can also better explain the spillover effects between more and more jobs and families. The reorganization of roles between men and women and the blurring of work-family boundaries have led to more and more research on work-family interactions, resulting in a large number of related research topics, such as rotation, flexible working hours, and dual employment families.

In real society, it is difficult to truly match the working environment, the individual, and the family system. With the development of economy and society, the increase of unemployed people, the flattening and linearization of work organization, and the acceleration of knowledge and technology innovation, various health risk factors have emerged endlessly. Therefore, the main task of occupational health psychology research is to adopt certain intervention strategies to work organizations on the basis of identifying various health risk factors to achieve the purpose of creating a healthy workplace. Among them, what is widely discussed by researchers is the construction of prevention strategies. Many researchers have proposed the establishment of a national strategy for the prevention of work-related psychological disorders. This strategy includes 4 basic aspects: organizational changes necessary to improve working conditions and reduce psychological hazards; information communication, education, and training of employees; enrichment of mental health services; and monitoring of risk factors and mental disorders ^[1] .