Mental health and hostility as predictors of temporary employment: Evidence from two prospective studies

Abstract

We used two studies to examine whether mental health and hostility predicted temporary employment. Study 1 involved a cohort of 970 Finnish hospital employees (102 men, 868 women) who had temporary job contracts at baseline. After adjustment for demographics, organisational tenure and part-time work status, doctor-diagnosed psychiatric disorder predicted continuing in temporary employment instead of receiving a permanent job by the end of the 2-year follow-up. A higher level of hostility was also associated with temporary employment, but only among employees in low socioeconomic positions. In Study 2, anxiety and aggressive behaviour were measured in a cohort of 226 Finnish school children (116 boys, 110 girls) at 8 years of age. Anxiety in childhood predicted temporary employment at age 42. Aggressive behaviour in childhood was related to ongoing temporary employment status in adulthood among individuals in low socioeconomic positions. Our findings suggest that selection by individual characteristics operates between the temporary and permanent workforces. Mental health problems, a part of which are already seen in childhood, seem to restrict individuals’ possibilities to gain secure labour market positions. Hostility and aggressiveness seem to be related to labour market prospects only among individuals in low socioeconomic positions.

Introduction

Worklife has changed considerably during the past two decades in most industrialised countries. Globalisation of economic activity, intensified competition with shortened product life cycles, heightened speed of change (especially in technology) and increased demands from consumers create new claims for productivity and flexibility in the labour market (Reilly, 1998). Although temporary employment has existed throughout the history of paid work, there is evidence of growth in the proportion of different forms of non-standard employment during the past two decades (Quinlan, Mayhew, & Bohle, 2001; Sutela, Vänskä, & Notkola, 2001). The public sector, which used to provide secure employment, has also been forced to implement restructuring and other new forms of work organisation. These include downsizing the workforce and increasing reliance on employment practices that depend on temporary workers.

Compared to permanent employment, temporary jobs are more insecure and may involve higher exposures to work hazards (Letourneux, 1997), aspects which have been shown to be associated with subsequent health problems (Bosma, Peter, Siegrist, & Marmot, 1998; Ferrie, 2001). However, results on health among temporary employees have been mixed, with some studies indicating worse health among temporary workers, and other studies showing no health differences or better health in temporary employees (Virtanen et al., in press).

These inconsistencies may, in part, be the consequences of a reversed causality in which poor health leads to downward mobility and good health promotes upward mobility (West, 1991). People suffering from illness or impairment may have a higher risk of ending up unemployed or working under hazardous conditions because health problems lower their chances of competing for good labour market positions (Bartley, 1988). Context-specific factors, such as national unemployment rates, may also contribute to this process. When competition for jobs is heavy, health and other individual attributes may be particularly predictive of transfer from one employment status to another (Virtanen et al., in press).

Research on health and on individual characteristics as predictors of employment status is not without challenges. From the employers’ point of view, mental health problems may impair work ability (Pattani, Constantinovici, & Williams, 2001) and increase healthcare and related costs, and hostility may be viewed as a sign of poor co-operation. From the individual's point of view, the question of social discrimination comes up; that is how society evaluates particular characteristics, such as health or related attributes, and allocates the occupational opportunities accordingly (West, 1991).

Most of the earlier research in this field has been focussed on the determinants of unemployment and socioeconomic status. For example, psychiatric disorders have been shown to predict unemployment (Bartley & Owen, 1996; Leino-Arjas, Liira, Mutanen, Malmivaara, & Matikainen, 1999; Whooley et al., 2002) and downward mobility in socioeconomic status (Dohrenwend et al., 1992). Studies on the early life predictors of adulthood employment report that emotional problems in childhood are associated with career instability in terms of changing jobs and having periods of unemployment (Pulkkinen, Ohranen, & Tolvanen, 1999). Mental health disorders in adolescence have predicted poor educational attainment (Fergusson & Woodward, 2002; Kessler, Foster, Saunders, & Stang, 1995) and unemployment (Hammarström & Janlert, 1997).

In addition to mental health, other individual characteristics may predict employment status. Hostility, a personality characteristic defined as trait anger, hostile beliefs about other people and proneness to aggressive behaviour, has been shown to increase the risk of social conflicts, morbidity and mortality (Miller, Smith, Turner, Guijarro, & Hallet, 1996). Common definitions of aggressive behaviour emphasise the intent to harm another person (Coie & Dodge, 1998). References to the emotional component of aggression are not typically made in these definitions. As noted by Pulkkinen (2001), anger, the emotional component of aggression, and hostility, a negative attitude, motivate a person for aggressive acts, but aggressive behaviour may also be displayed instrumentally. Hostile aggressive responding is characterised by intense autonomic arousal and strong responses to perceived threat. In contrast, instrumental aggression is characterised by little autonomic activation but rather an orientation toward what the aggressor sees as a reward or expected outcome of the behaviour.

The Jyväskylä Longitudinal Study of Personality and Social Development has focussed on self-control of emotions and other childhood predictors of adulthood career. This study from Finland found that aggressive behaviour in childhood is related to unstable career lines (e.g. poor school achievement and unstable employment (Rönkä, Kinnunen, & Pulkkinen, 2000; Rönkä & Pulkkinen, 1995)) and to increased likelihood of long-term unemployment (Kokko & Pulkkinen, 2000; Kokko, Pulkkinen, & Puustinen, 2000), but not short-term unemployment (Kivimäki et al., 2003a; Kokko et al., 2000). Moreover, early aggressive behaviour has been shown to be related to subsequent long-term unemployment via school problems and alcohol abuse (Kokko & Pulkkinen, 2000).

Other studies suggest that emotional and behavioural problems in childhood and adolescence, such as aggression, withdrawal, depression and anxiety, are associated with subsequent unemployment (Caspi, Wright, Moffitt, & Silva, 1998; Kokko et al., 2000; Lynn, Hampson, & Magee, 1984; Montgomery, Bartley, Cook, & Wadsworth, 1996). A 20-year follow-up study showed an association between high hostility in adolescence and poor career achievement at midlife (Siegler et al., 2003).

Studies that examine the predictors of the type of employment have been scarce. Good self-rated health, psychological wellbeing and job satisfaction (Virtanen, Kivimäki, Elovainio, & Vahtera, 2002), and tolerance of ambiguity and role adjustment (Bauer & Truxillo, 2000) have predicted a shift from temporary to permanent employment. Neither of these studies specified the role of other individual characteristics, e.g. psychiatric disorder or hostility, as predictors of employment status change. What is also unclear is whether correlates of mental health and aggressiveness are already present before the person enters the labour market.

As is already known, hostile individuals are at a greater risk for health problems and absence from work due to sickness than are other individuals (Houston & Kelly, 1989; Julkunen, Salonen, Kaplan, Chesney, & Salonen, 1994; Koskenvuo et al., 1988; Siegler, Peterson, Barefoot, & Williams, 1992; Smith, 1992; Vahtera, Kivimäki, Koskenvuo, & Pentti, 1997). They also experience the transitory state of anger and express aggression more frequently and more intensely than do other people (Miller et al., 1996). These are both characteristics which may prevent permanent employment in modern work life where health and social skills are highly valued, especially if there is any competition for employment.

However, hostility appears to be a risk primarily under difficult circumstances, but not necessarily under more favourable or stable conditions (Kivimäki, Vahtera, Koskenvuo, Uutela, & Pentti, 1998). Low socioeconomic position may be treated as a marker of a wide variety of difficult circumstances, including work, and the degree of chronic stress experienced by individuals is heavily influenced by their socioeconomic position (Taylor, Repetti, & Seeman, 1997). Similarly, mental health problems may have more pronounced effects under less favourable social contexts. Therefore, the effect of mental health and hostility on future employment status may be dependent on the socioeconomic position of the employee.

Gender has been suggested to modify career status paths. Pulkkinen et al. (1999) found that a personality dimension, social passivity, explained career instability among women but not among men. Earlier research has not, however, focussed on the association between other personal characteristics, such as mental health and hostility, as predictors of employment status from the gender perspective.

Finally, some studies suggest that the relationships between individual characteristics and job loss are mediated through lifestyle factors such as high alcohol use (Kokko & Pulkkinen, 2000). Problem drinking may be associated with mental health problems in early life, and therefore the role of problem drinking should be taken into account in studying the relationship between childhood characteristics and temporary employment status at midlife.

In this paper we present two longitudinal studies on mental health, hostility and temporary employment. Firstly, we examined whether mental health and hostility predict remaining in temporary employment in a cohort of temporary hospital workers. Secondly, we studied whether anxiety and aggressive behaviour, when measured before entry into the labour market, are predictive of temporary labour market status three decades later, and whether the associations are mediated through problem drinking. In both studies, we examined the extent to which the role of mental health and hostility/aggressive behaviour in the selection process varies according to gender and socioeconomic status.