Towards an integrated model: The joint effect of work shift design and organizational policies in preventing Shift Work Disorder

• Autor(a) principal: Valentim, Sofia de Lima
• Data de Publicação: 2022
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10071/26945
• topic: Circadian clock; Shift work disorder; Shift design; Organizational policies; Relógio circadiano; Distúrbio do trabalho por turnos; Desenho dos turnos; Políticas organizacionais

Shift work is a need for the functioning of today's society, however, it can influence the natural circadian clock and lead to "Shift Work Disorder" (SWD), which is characterized by insomnia and sleepiness symptoms associated with work schedule and that carries several negative consequences for individuals' health and safety. So far, the literature has been focused on studying different predictors of individual and organizational nature that may pose a higher risk for SWD prevalence, but only in a parallel way. It is from this gap in the literature that the model proposed in this dissertation emerges, which intends to understand the moderating role of shift design and the role organizational policies may play in the relationship between characteristics such as gender, age, and sleep time, and SWD. For this purpose, 212 nurses voluntarily completed a questionnaire that included these different concepts, and it was found that gender and sleep time are significantly associated with SWD. Additionally, shift design and organizational policies proved to be significant moderators in the relationship between age and SWD. Organizational policies, on the other hand, were not shown to moderate the role of shift design between any of the individual variables and SWD. These results alert us to the importance of a proper shift design and the implementation of good organizational practices for older workers, while we also understand that these may not be sufficient to mitigate the negative effects of poorly design work shifts.