Test Of New Effort-reward Imbalance Model Among Chinese Nurses

Presently,there are some limitations on the verification of new effort-reward imbalance(ERI)model as follows.Firstly,covariation between variables may happen when effort,reward and overcommitment were entered at the same level in multiple linear regression analysis in some studies.Secondly,there is little research reporting the comparison of the influence on health outcomes among the three variables.Lastly,the results regarding the moderating effect of overcommitment on the relationship between ERI and health outcomes(e.g.,work burnout)are inconsistent in the previous studies.The inconsistency might be because ERI is not the characteristic work stress of the investigated samples.Additionally,female nurses are typical population with high ERI in China.This study aimed to validate the new ERI model among nurses.It hypotheses that effort,reward and overcommitment can independently predict work satisfaction and work burnout,and their prediction roles are different,and that the effort-reward ratio can predict work satisfaction and work burnout,and that overcommitment can moderate the relationship between the ratio and work satisfaction as well as work burnout.This study randomly recruited 468 female nurses from nine hospitals in Nanjing,Jiangsu.Effort,reward and overcommitment were measured with Chinese version of the effort-reward imbalance scale;job satisfaction with Chinese version of Job Satisfaction Questionnaire compiled by Hirokazu Yoshikawa including six dimensions,material demanding,work load,mental load,job autonomy,supervisor supporting,colleague supporting;work burnout with Chinese version of Maslach Burnout Inventory-General Survey(MBI-GS)including three dimensions,emotional exhaustion,cynicism and professional inefficacy and with Chinese version of Copenhagen Burnout Inventory(CBI)including personal burnout,work-related burnout and client-related burnout.Mplus6.11 and SPSS20.0 were utilized for the test of common method bias and multiple linear regressions that are conducted to examine the independent effects of effort,reward,overcommitment and the effort-reward ratio,and the moderation effect of overcommitment in association with the effort-reward ratio and work burnout.In this study,there was no heavy common method bias between ERI and MBI-GS scales after examining one-factor,two-factor,four-factor and six-factor models where two-factor model set ERI one factor and MBI-GS as another factor,and four-factor model set the two dimensions with bigger correlation coefficient in ERI or MBI-GS scale as one factors,and another dimension as one factor,and another dimensions in ERI scale as one factor and another dimensions in MBI-GS scale as one factor.Similar tests did not find that there was no heavy common method bias between ERI and job satisfaction or CBI scales.The results revealed that effort positively predicted emotional exhaustion,cynicism and all three dimensions of CBI,and negatively predicted all six dimensions of job satisfaction and professional efficacy.Reward negatively predicted cynicism and all three dimensions of CBI,and positively predicted material demanding,job autonomy,supervisor supporting and professional efficacy.Overcommitment positively predicted emotional exhaustion,cynicism and all three dimensions of CBI,and negatively predicted working load and mental load.Among the three variables,effort showed the strongest prediction role and reward did the weakest prediction role.The effort-reward ratio positively predicted emotional exhaustion,cynicism and all three dimensions of CBI,and negatively predicted all six dimensions of job satisfaction and professional efficacy.Overcommitment moderated the influences of the effortreward ratio on emotional exhaustion,professional efficacy,mental load and colleague supporting.For both high and low-overcommitment nurses,effort-reward ratio could negatively predict the satisfaction on mental load,but the effect of effort-reward ratio on high-overcommitment nurses was greater than that on the low-overcommitment ones.For both high and low-overcommitment nurses,effort-reward ratio could negatively predict the satisfaction on colleague supporting,and the effect of effortreward ratio on low-overcommitment nurses was greater than that on the highovercommitment ones.For both high and low-overcommitment nurses,effort-reward ratio could positively predict the emotional exhaustion,but the effect of effort-reward ratio on low-overcommitment nurses was greater than that on the highovercommitment ones.For low-overcommitment nurses,effort-reward ratio could negatively predict the professional inefficacy,but the effect of effort-reward ratio on the high-overcommitment nurses was not significant,which means the effect of effortreward ratio on low-overcommitment nurses is greater than that on highovercommitment ones.In conclusion,these results strongly support new ERI model.