THE EFFECT OF WORK DIMENSIONS AND NEED FOR AUTONOMY ON NURSES WORK SATISFACTION AND HEALTH

A study of nurses' job satisfaction, experienced job significance, psychological and psychosomatic health complaints and sickness absenteeism is reported. Hackman & Oldham's Job Characteristics Model was an important starting-point for the study. The relationships of characteristics of nursing jobs, leadership style and type of nursing care system to such reactions of nurses to their work are analysed and the possible moderating role of preference for autonomy is investigated. Subjects are 561 trained staff nurses from 36 nursing units in 16 Dutch hospitals. Variables are assessed by means of questionnaires. Stepwise regression analysis reveals that variances in the four dependent variables to a certain extent can be explained by the nine predictors. Some job characteristics (e.g. feedback and clarity and autonomy), as well as social-emotional leadership positively affect nurses' reactions. Other dependent variables (e.g. work pressure and instrumental leadership) appear to have negative effects. Using subgroup regression analysis, evidence for a moderating role of need for autonomy is found to be rather scarce.