A lack of workplace support is associated with depression, says new research.
“Respondents who reported low levels of support from colleagues had twice the likelihood of having significant depression symptoms compared to those who report[ed] having support,” says the study, The Relationship between Work Characteristics, Wellbeing, Depression and Workplace Bullying.
“Consistent with the association between support from colleagues and depression, low levels of support from one’s manager was also associated with significantly higher risk of depression symptoms.”
The study shows that the risk of depression also appears to be affected by relational justice: superiors who provide consistent and sufficient information, who are willing to listen to problems and who provide criticism or praise.
The study reveals “a pattern of increasing risk of depression with declining levels of relational justice, with those reporting the poorest organisational culture showing significantly greater risk of depression compared to those reporting the best organisational culture”.
Workplace bullying was also associated with increased incidence of depression.
But the report notes, “It is not just the experience of depression symptoms that is seen to be elevated among those who experience workplace bullying.”
Suicidal thoughts are also more likely in those who are currently being bullied at work. They are “about twice as likely as those never bullied to report feeling that their life is hardly worth living, report feeling that they would be better off dead, and report that they had thought of taking their own life”, the report states.
The findings are part of the Australian National University’s Personality & Total Health (PATH) Through Life Project longitudinal study, which began in 1999.
The latest results are from interviews conducted in 2011–2012 with workers who were then aged between 32 and 36 years.
For help and support, phone Lifeline on 13 11 14.
For more details on the study, visit Safe Work Australia.
Link to the report HERE
Miss Tammy responds with a head and gusset full of steam.
Well DUH!!.
I heard this report on the radio this morning, about time someone called out the elephant in the room, but still we’re willing to accept this?, granted, i realise we aren’t living in Russia, but we were on such a great course to lead the world, and be what we now kid ourselves we are.
As i watch my workmates fall by the wayside to suicide, depression and heart disease, the fight for what is fair and safe in the workplace has deserted Ostrayans, replaced with a mantra of apathy, and actions of ‘I’m alright jack, fuck you’. The self proclaimed deluded boast of Ostraya being the land of a fair go, is just another aspect of our bullshit, non reality notion of national pride.
We showed (at least a majority did) what a nation of pathetic, non engaged, self centered, greedy people we are during our recent election.
But still we kid ourselves, with an arrogance that is vulgar and sickening, that Ostraya is quarantined from the worst of the rest of the world, some sort of oasis of fairness, looking out for your mates (she’ll be right mate), non sexist, racist, homophobic or greedy, well i’m calling bullshit. Your mileage mary vary. This is Greg Swan, and yes, it’s Monday morning.
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