Research in job satisfaction has been in existence for almost seven decades and most research in it was attempted to establish a link between employee attitude and the work results. Job satisfaction is considered as the key employee attitude which determines many organizational behaviors such as job performance, organizational commitment, employee turnover, absenteeism, etc. (Locke, 1976), and it is a complex issue which is still elusive to the practicing managers (who look forward to managing people effectively) . The concept is available for newer and diverse researches.
The concept of job satisfaction is central not only to psychological and managerial discipline; it also has an influence in health sciences too. Most of the pioneering works in job satisfaction was done in North America and Europe, but recently Asian countries also have begun paying attention to employee attitudes. The article by Mei-Chin Chen, et al. (2014) is evidence to the vibrancy of the concept of job satisfaction in terms of geography, discipline and era.
The researchers have quoted that work stress, job satisfaction, and quality of life (QoL) among nurses as closely related. They have observed that previous researches on work stress and job satisfaction focused on the clinical nurses. But the nature of the job of nurses working in anesthesiology department is qualitatively different from another type nursing. Anesthetic nurses often need to confront situations of sudden changes in patients’ vital signs. Varied surgical procedures and varying anesthetic reactions of patients force the nurses to keep a high degree of vigilance and quick response.
A study reported in the article analyzed the factors influencing the quality of Life of anesthetic nurses and its correlation with work stress and job satisfaction. The participants of the study were from three medical centers in southern Taiwan, who had at least six months experience in the hospital. The cross sectional study used psychometrically valid instruments such as Questionnaire of Medical Workers' Stress (QMWS), SF-36 QoL scale, etc. The data was collected using the chosen instruments and data analysis was done through SPSS (Statistical Program for social sciences).
The study observed that nurses who regularly exercise scored higher in SF-36 QoL suggesting a correlation between exercise and quality of life. Similar conclusion was reached by Lin, Wen, and Wei (2007) who studied the relationship between Taiwanese adults’ leisure, exercise, and health activities and their Quality of Life. Another significant finding is that those who had a higher score on Quality of life showed lesser tendency for job turnover. Significantly negative correlation with job satisfaction was also identified indicating that there is a link between quality of life and job satisfaction. A study has confirmed that nurses who undergo work stress had lower job satisfaction, which further aggravates quality of life.
A review of various researches on job satisfaction shows that there are environmental and personal factors that influence job satisfaction. The common environmental factors are organizational policies, work content, relationship / communication with the superiors and peers, etc. Personal factors that influence the job satisfaction include genetic, cultural and personality variables. Job satisfaction tend to increase in the presence of mentally challenging work, personal interest in work, physically not exhausting, meaningful and contributive work content, working conditions that enhances the feeling of achievement, absence of role conflicts, culture of appreciation and encouragement.
REFERENCES
Locke, E. A. (1976). Nature and causes of Job satisfaction. M. D Dunnette (Ed), Handbook of Industrial and organizational psychology, Chicago: Rand McNally.
Hulin, C. L., & Judge, T. A. (2003). Job attitudes. In W. C. Borman, D. R. ligen, & R. J. Klimoski (Eds.), Handbook of psychology: Industrial and organizational psychology, Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley.
Mei-Chin Chen, Ying-Wei Huang , Chien-An Sun, Chao-Hsien Lee, Szu-Mei Hsiao, Yu-Ching Chou, Tung-Chen Han, and Tsan Yang4. (2014). "Factors Influencing the Quality of Life of Nurse Anesthetists and the Correlations Among Work Stress, Job Satisfaction, and Quality of Life: A Case Study of Three Medical Centers in Southern Taiwan, ". World Journal of Medicine and Medical Science, Vol. 2, No. 2, February 2014, PP: 1 – 17.
Lin,Y.C.,Wen,C.P.,& Wai,J.M(2007). Leisure-time Physical Activity and Its Association with Health Behaviors, Health Status and Health-related Quality of Life among Taiwanese Adults. Taiwan Journal of Public Health,26(3),218-228.
