Job Demands-Resources Profiles and Work Capabilities: Effects on Early Childhood Development Practitioners’ Functioning

Abstract

This study examined the associations between early childhood development practitioners’ job demands-resources profiles, work capabilities, engagement, and intentions to leave. A cross-sectional survey was administered to a convenience sample (N = 426) of early childhood development practitioners in two provinces in South Africa. The Job Demands-Resources Scale (Rothmann et al., A psychometric evaluation of the job demands-resources scale in South Africa. SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, 32(4):76–86, 2006. https://hdl.handle.net/10520/EJC89107), Capability Set for Work Questionnaire (Abma et al., Scandinavian Journal Work, Environment and Health 42:34–42, 2016), Work Engagement Scale (Rautenbach and Rothmann, Journal of Psychology in Africa 27:303–309, 2017), and Intention to Leave Scale (Sjöberg and Sverke, Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 41:247–252, 2000) were administered. Latent profile analyses resulted in four job demands-resources profiles: high demands-low resources (33.18%), moderate demands-high resources (17.17%), moderate demands-low job resources (30.39%), and moderate demands-moderate resources (19.3%). Early childhood practitioners who were in moderate demands-high resources (rather than high demands-low resources or moderate demands-low job resources) jobs and had a robust capability set showed high work engagement and low intentions to leave their jobs. Job demands-resources profiles indirectly affected early childhood development practitioners’ work engagement and intentions to leave via their capability sets.