NOTE ON THE ROLE OF NEGATIVE AFFECTIVITY IN UNDERSTANDING RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN SELF-REPORTS OF EXERCISE AND SICK LEAVE

Previous research indicates that observed correlations between self-re ports of job stress and self-reports of strain may be reduced after pa rtialling out the variance due to the personality trait of negative af fectivity. The present study examined the effect of negative affectivi ty on the relationships between self-reports of exercise and strain in a sample of 128 governmental employees. While the magnitudes of the b ivariate correlations between exercise and strain were small, the resu lts of semipartial correlation analyses were somewhat consistent with expectations that the magnitudes of bivariate correlations between exe rcise participation and self-reports of strain would be reduced after controlling for negative affectivity in measures of strain. The implic ations of these findings for incorporating a measure of negative affec tivity in studies of exercise-strain relationships involving self-repo rts are discussed.