Thinking Big: An Integrative Conceptual Review of the Workplace Consequences of Obesity and a Theoretical Extension of the Processes That Create Them

摘要

Obesity is a condition that affects much of the world's population and generates substantial costs to organizations and their employees. Multiple scholarly disciplines have generated a significant body of literature on the workplace consequences of obesity. Strikingly, however, the applied psychology and management literatures-a natural home for such research- have largely ignored this topic while embracing related issues like health, wellness, disability, and others. This paper seeks to invigorate organizational research on obesity by collecting, cataloging, integrating, and extending the disparate research streams that have explored the workplace consequences of obesity. To do so, this paper reviews empirical and conceptual studies on the workplace consequences of obesity, identifies weaknesses limiting the field's growth and impact, and builds an integrative theoretical framework that addresses these weaknesses. In doing so, we extend the field's understanding of the processes leading to-and the boundary conditions related to- obesity's influence on work outcomes for employees. Specifically, we broaden the field's focus by looking beyond the psychological processes (primarily stigmatization) that underlie obesity effects to consider the impact of both economic and medical perspectives as well. In all, this review integrates the multidisciplinary obesity literature by challenging the view that obesity effects can be primarily understood through a stigma-based lens. In so doing, we offer contributions not just to the obesity literature, but to related areas of health and social categorizations as well, and hope to revitalize work on a serious issue facing today's organizations and the people who work in them.