The impact of organizational changes on work stress, sleep, recovery and health

Abstract

The study objective was to investigate the impact of different kinds of organizational changes, as well as anticipation of such changes, on work-related stress, sleep, recovery and health. It was hypothesized that impaired sleep and recovery increase the adverse health consequences of organizational changes. The data consisted of cross sectional questionnaire data from a random sample of 1,523 employees in the Swedish police force. It could be shown that extensive organizational changes including downsizing or a change in job tasks were associated with a small increase in work stress, disturbed sleep, incomplete recovery and health complaints. However, less extensive organizational changes like relocation did not affect these outcome variables. Anticipation of extensive organizational changes had almost the same effect as actual changes. Furthermore a moderating effect of sleep and work stress on gastrointestinal complaints and depressive symptoms was found. Thus, like former studies already suggested, extensive organizational changes resulted in increased stress levels, poorer health and impaired sleep and recovery. Furthermore, organizational instability due to anticipation of changes was as negative as actual changes. There was also some evidence that disturbed sleep increased these adverse health effects, in particular with respect to anticipation of organizational changes. © 2011 by National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health.