Job insecurity, coping and health-related behaviour

Abstract

Across the world, job insecurity plays a critical role in organisations. This insecurity affects not only the individual, but also the organisation. In South Africa, the Employment Equity Act (No. 55 of 1998), and the Broad-Based Socio-Economic Empowerment Charter for the South African Mining Industry (Mining Charter), brought changes to the mining industry policies and decision-making process in terms of selection and recruitment, which could in turn lead to feelings of job insecurity. Other factors such as the availability of gold left to be mined, restructuring and strikes increase work-related stress. The objectives of this study were to investigate the role of job insecurity in predicting health related behaviours, and to determine whether coping moderates the effect of job insecurity on health behaviours for a group of managers in a South African gold mining company. A cross-sectional design was used. The study population (n = 206) consisted of managers in a gold mining company in South Africa The Job Insecurity Scale, Cybernetic Coping Scale and Health Complaints Questionnaire were used as measuring instruments. Descriptive statistics (e.g. means, standard deviations and kurtosis) were used to analyse the data. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis was used to test for the hypothesized moderating effect of coping on the relation between job insecurity and health-related behaviours. The results of the regression analyses showed that qualitative job insecurity was a significant predictor of health complaints. Qualitative job insecurity was also a significant predictor of health complaints in employees who smoked cigarettes and drank alcohol, and exercised at least once a week. Quantitative job insecurity did not play a role in predicting health-related behaviour. Coping did not moderate the effects of job insecurity for employees with health complaints. Rather, it is suggested that using negative coping behaviours may actually contribute to health complaints. Recommendations for future research are made.