Difficult Work Conditions and Youths' Mental Health: Selection or Causation

摘要

This prospective longitudinal study examined the effect of two work conditions (work demands and decision latitude) and their interaction on five measures of mental illness: depressive, anxiety, and alcohol abuse disorder, as well as depressive and anxiety symptoms. Additionally, the extent to which any of these relationships were due to youth with prior mental health problems being selected or selecting stressful job conditions. Participants included 604 working young adults (M age: 22), a subsample of a randomly selected sample in a community-based longitudinal study. Information on family environment, youth characteristics, and mental illness were gathered prospectively during interviews in 1983, 1985-1986, and 1992. Youths who were working in 1992 or in the previous year were asked questions about the two work conditions. Relationships between work conditions and mental illness were modeled using hierarchical linear and logistic regression as well as structural equation modeling and two stage least squares analyses.