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Since Kornhauser’s (1965) pioneering book, Mental Health and the Industrial Worker, a growing list of researchers have devoted extensive energy toward understanding the deliterious effects of employment conditions on the mental and physical health of the worker. The reasons are many. For example, research indicates that work stress is related to psychiatric ailments, coronary heart disease (Ivancevich & Matteson, 1980), employee withdrawal behavior (McGrath, 1976). Moreover, recent research documents that organizations may suffer direct financial consequences as a result of occupational stress. With skyrocketing medical costs, rising insurance claims, and worker compensation, organizations can no longer afford to ignore health related issues. Many stress factors have been explored and found to be tied to the health of the worker, but one that has not received much attention is job security. Job security is an issue for all levels of the working world (Greenhalgh & Rosenblatt, 1985). Individual employees, labor unions, and management groups have all begun to focus on the advantages of a secure working environment. There is, however, considerable skepticism surrounding the ultimate benefits of job security and doubts about the negative consequences associated with instable jobs. Unfortunately, social scientists have been slow to step in and fill this knowledge gap. Few studies have directly or systematically focused on job security; instead, when security has been examined it has typically been a component of more general work attitudes. Despite public clamor and debate over job security, as yet, very little is known about the importance, or the psychosocial consequences of insecure work. Previous research, while limited, suggests that job security may be related to performance, attitudes toward their work, the type of job for one looks, and health of the worker. Evans and Molinari (1970) report an association between increased security and increases in quantity, although not quality, of output in a manufacturing setting (Evans & Molinari, 1970) . In a service organization, however, both productivity (quantity) and quality of performance were positively related to employees’ job security (Jick, 1980). The relationship between job security and turnover is less clear. Some (e.g., Kerr, 1948) have reported job security to be negatively related to turnover while others (e.g., Jick, 1980) have reported opposite results. The importance of job security to specific individuals and its availability in certain occupations have also been shown to influence the type of job one looks for (Roper, 1947; Office of Personnel Management , 1979). a process which can affect other organizational factors (e.g., EEOC compliance, selection ratios). In addition, past research has suggested that job security may be related to workers’ attitudes toward their work. Job enrichment studies, for example. have found that job security can moderate workers’ responses to enrichment programs with Karl KUHNERT and Samuel GREEN The Consequences of Insecure Work Across Organizations employees tending to “respond more positively to complex. challenging work when they are satisfied with various aspects of the work context” (Oldham, Hackman & Pierce, 1976). Similarly, Jick (1980) found that workers secure in their jobs were much less resistant to changes in an organization facing financial crisis than those workers who were insecure; and insecure workers reported less loyalty and pride in the corporation than secure employees. Finally, a few researchers have suggested that there is a direct link between job security and the mental and physical health of employees. Kornhauser’s (1965) treatise on the mental health of industrial workers reported that feelings of job security are “related to the mental health of workers, al though not to... occupational differences in mental health” (p. 45). In a more recent study, London. Crandall and Sears (1977) found a positive relationship between workers’ satisfaction with the amount of security in their jobs and the overall quality of life. In addition, Jick (1980) reported that workers experiencing high levels of insecurity were more likely to experience depression, anxiety, and irritation, than were their more secure colleagues. These studies suggest that job security is a work-related construct that may have important implications, not only for the productivity and stability of the workplace, but also for the health and well-being of workers. At present however, most stress research results lack generalizability. This is because the common design in organizational research is to select an organization and administer questionnaires to gather individual’s perceptions of both organizational conditions and individual responses. What is missing in organizational stress research are results than can be generalized across organizations. The present study explores the relationship between job security, the structure of work, workers’ attitudes, and the mental...

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