Job characteristics, fatigue and motivation : is a happy and healthy worker a productive worker?

This paper outlines a research program for exploring the relationship between job characteristics, fatigue and motivation within the workplace. This research program expands upon the job demands-control model (Theorell & Karasek, 1996), taking into account individual differences in the perception of workplace stressors. Theorell and Karasek’s (1996) model claim that an active work environment leads to greater levels of learning motivation while a high strain environment leads to burnout and fatigue. The dynamic model predicts that over time learning motivation will impede feelings of burnout, and vice versa. This dynamic model of job characteristics, burnout and motivation are likely to be moderated by individual differences. This paper outlines a program of study, consisting of a two wave longitudinal sample, to test and extend the model, as they apply to secondary high school teachers. In extending this model, an important goal of this program is to investigate if motivation and fatigue is a product of the workplace environment or the personal characteristics that are brought to the workplace. Given the importance of teachers’ influence on children’s learning processes, the results of this research could aid in workplace interventions that increase teacher wellbeing and effectiveness, in addition to school-related outcomes