#0057 Is work engagement associated with healthier dietary patterns? A cross-sectional study
How we work is what we eat: satisfaction at work leads to better diet
Work engagement is the satisfied state of mind when one is happy with their job. On the other hand, job burnout refers to an exhausted and depressed state of mind caused by work related stress. It is natural to expect that job burnout has many negative effects on one’s health. However, it is not well studied whether work engagement can have positive or negative effects on one’s health.
We know from previous studies that work engagement would have a positive impact on psychological health. People with psychological stress engage in bad health habits like smoking and alcohol consumption. However, could work engagement have an effect on eating habits? Is it possible that people who are happy in their jobs engage in healthy eating habits? We wanted to answer this question.
To do this, we surveyed 10,742 employees from 12 companies in Japan. These companies ranged from information technology to hospitals, housing sales to encompass all of Japan’s industrial structure. We then asked people what they eat and how frequently they eat. We used this to estimate intake of 7 nutrients such as salt, dietary fat, fiber, folate and isoflavone.
We found that people who are happy in their jobs often eat more healthy foods such as good fats (unsaturated fatty acids), fiber, and folate. Unexpectedly, we found that high salt intake is also associated with job engagement. We attributed this high salt intake to mostly those participants that came from a lower socio-economic status (SES). This wasn't surprising because previous studies have shown that low SES households eat more salt in Japan.
Our study concludes that job engagement leads to better eating habits. We think it is because people who are happy in their jobs often engage in healthy habits like goal setting, self-efficacy, motivation, and self-regulation and are therefore more likely to maintain healthy lifestyle to be able to enjoy their work more. This is a very interesting finding because previous studies have only looked at job engagement from employer’s perspective like job performance and employee turnover rate. However, a study like this highlights the importance of happiness in job for an overall healthy life.
Link to the original journal article:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/1348-9585.12149
Title of the paper:
Is work engagement associated with healthier dietary patterns? A cross-sectional study
Authors:
Hoichi Amano, Yoshiharu Fukuda, Megu Y. Baden, Ichiro Kawachi
