Research Proposal

Research question

Does work affect a person’s mental health?

Motivation

Hari mentioned in ‘Lost Connections’ that only 13% of people find their job meaningful. Working is something that everyone has to do in their life it cannot be avoided. With depression and anxiety on the rise there must be some correlation with a person’s work and their mental health.

Genre

Blog post

Timeline

Research proposal due: 10/1

Part A due: 10/3

References

Website 1

“Furthermore, occupational burnout may exert a partial mediating effect on the relationship between work stress and depression level.”

Lin, T. C., Lin, H. S., Cheng, S. F., & Wu, L. M. (2016, February 23). Work stress, occupational burnout and depression levels: a clinical study of paediatric intensive care unit nurses in Taiwan. Retrieved from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jocn.13119

In the book Hari talked about how a meaningless job can link to depression. However the experiment suggests that there is a correlation between burnout causing work anxiety and depression. It does not mention whether the job is meaningful or not.

Website 2

“Patients with work anxiety described their workplace significantly more negatively than patients without work anxiety and employees in the general population, with no differences in workplace descriptions between psychosomatic patients without work anxiety and the general population sample.”

Muschalla, Fay, & Linden. (2015, October 28). Self-reported workplace perception as indicators of work anxieties. Retrieved from https://academic.oup.com/occmed/article/66/2/168/2750613.

Employed patients in a psychosomatic rehabilitation hospital with common mental disorders participated in completing a survey. The results were that the amount of work anxiety would have a negative impact on how they describe their job while people without work anxiety and with the same job gave a more positive review of their job.

Website 3

“Evidence exists that high job demands, as well as low job control and social support, increase the risk of depression.”

JariHakanena. (2014, April 2). Relationship between burnout and depressive symptoms: A study using the person-centred approach. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2213058614000060?via=ihub#sec0005.

This quote supports what Hari mentioned about depression. A higher job demand, higher amount of unsociable hours and low control over your work can increase the risk of depression.

Solutions

A problem with work burnouts is due to the company’s demands from the workers. A solution to this problem has to start with the company itself. This requires companies to set targets which are reasonable for employees to meet. Another solution to this is the way the company distributes a group project accordingly so that everyone has an equal role in the project instead of putting most of the burden on one person which could lead to job burnout. 

Keywords

• Meaningless jobs
• Control
• Work burnout
• Company hierarchy
• Depression
• Contributions at work
• Work anxiety
• Responsibility at work
• Job satisfaction
• Work environment