DO YOU THINK THAT YOUR HEALTH OR SAFETY ARE AT RISK BECAUSE OF YOUR WORK - A LARGE EUROPEAN STUDY ON PSYCHOLOGICAL AND PHYSICAL WORK DEMANDS

A secondary analysis was performed on a large scale cross-sectional su rvey (n = 12500) by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Liv ing and Working Conditions. The analysis investigates (1) 'strain', i. e. whether or not employees in 12 European Union (EU) member states co nsidered their health ur safety to be at risk because of their work in relation to psychological demands, job control and social support, (2 ) the unique contribution of(a combination of) these job characteristi cs in explaining differences in health and safety risk (HSR), (3) the explanatory value of these job characteristics in comparison to physic al job demands, and (4) the relative strength of these determinants in each of rh 12 EU member states. Results show that (1) psychological d emands, job control and social support are all related to a perceived health and safety risk in the work situation; (2) each of these charac teristics has an unique contribution; (3) physical demands, when added to the model, are by Or the most influential determinant; and (4) in a cross-national comparison, physical demands are found to bi the most influential determinant of HSR in all EU member states. The importanc e of this study is its large scale and European character. An importan t limitation, however, relates tu the operationalization of the depend ent variable. It is concluded that high psychological demands per, je constitute a risk of illness and injury from work. The larger number o f European employees who consider their health or safety to be at risk because of their work, underlines the necessity of monitoring risk fa ctors and risk groups and of prevention, and also of adequate legislat ion with respect to working conditions. An important implication of th is study is that one should be careful not to underestimate the impact of traditional blue collar stressors in working life in Europe.