The role of satisfaction with occupational status, neuroticism, financial strain and categories of experience in predicting mental health in the unemployed

This study tests the contributions of the latent functions of employment (l atent deprivation model; Jahoda, 1981. Jahoda, M. (1981). Work, employment and unemployment: Values theories and approaches in social research. Americ an Psychologist, 36, 184-191), the manifest functions of employment (agency restriction model; Fryer, 1986: Fryer, D. M. (1986). Employment deprivatio n and personal agency during unemployment: A critical discussion of Jahoda' s explanation of the psychological effects of unemployment. Social Behaviou r, 1, 3-23) and personality (trait neuroticism) in accounting for psycholog ical distress in the unemployed. Eighty-one unemployed individuals were ass essed on measures of psychological distress (GHQ-12; Goldberg, 1972: Goldbe rg, D. P. (1972). The detection of psychiatric illness by questionnaire. Lo ndon: Oxford University Press), the latent functions of employment (activit y, time structure, social contact, status, collective purpose), financial s train, trait neuroticism, and a measure of labour market satisfaction. It w as shown that the latent functions of employment and financial strain were each able to contribute significantly to the prediction of psychological di stress over and above that predicted by Neuroticism, which alone also contr ibuted significantly to the prediction of distress. Results are related to the latent deprivation and agency restriction models of well-being and it i s argued that temperament needs to be considered in any explanation of the negative psychological effects of unemployment. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science L td. All rights reserved.