Arbeit und Gesundheit: Zur objektiven Erfassung von Tätigkeitsmerkmalen nach dem Job Demand-Control Modell

The aim of the present study was to assess the two job characteristics of the Job Demand-Control Model (Karasek, 1979), job demands and decision latitude, on the basis of objective task analyses. It was hypothesised that there is a relationship between the objectively assessed job characteristics and health outcomes. Based on theoretical considerations, scales of the Task Diagnosis Survey TBS (Rudolph et al., 1987) were selected to measure the job charac-teristics. The new scales Job Demands TBS and Decision Latitude TBS were tested in a sample of 468 employees of different professions and relationships with relaxation ability, vital exhaustion and cardiovascular rewind at night were analysed. Simultaneous confirmatory fac-tor analyses of the selected TBS-scales and the Items of a questionnaire measuring job de-mands and decision latitude (FIT, Richter et al., 2000) confirmed the construct validity. Hier-archical regression analyses showed that high objectively assessed job demands, high subjec-tively assessed job demands and low subjectively assessed decision latitude were related to disturbed relaxation ability and vital exhaustion. Cardiovascular rewind at night was related to objectively assessed decision latitude but not to subjectively assessed job characteristics. Dis-turbed cardiovascular rewind at night was more likely if objectively assessed decision latitude was low. The assessment of job demands and decision latitude on the basis of the TBS offers the opportunity to assess job characteristics independently of the employee’s perception. Furthermore, implications for job design activities can be drawn directly.