Salud laboral en profesionales del trabajo social

Abstract

The doctoral thesis "Occupational health in social work professionals" aims to approach the issue of quality of working life in social workers by studying a series of psychosocial variables that affect their professional performance, and is considered as a starting point for developing strategies that will lead to a significant improvement in their working conditions. In the midst of this doctoral thesis, a new line of work had to be adapted and incorporated to reflect the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the social services system and its professionals from March 2020, during a period when they had to deal rapidly with numerous changes in their organisations, especially with the need to incorporate teleworking in many organisations. Thus, the general objectives of this doctoral thesis were: to evaluate some of the psychosocial variables engagement, burnout, passion for work, organisational commitment and structural empowerment, and the relationship between them, in a sample of workers in the field of social intervention (social workers, educators, psychologists, etc.) (Article 1). Second: To assess these same psychosocial variables and their relationships, but in a sample specifically composed of social workers (Article 2). And thirdly, and as a result of the situation arising from the pandemic: to analyse the impact and profile of social services professionals who teleworked during the pandemic (Article 3). For Article 1, the sample consisted of 488 social workers (social workers, social educators, psychologists, etc.). For Article 2, the sample was extended to 501 professionals, all of whom were social workers. In both cases, the criterion was that the participants had been working in the same job and in the same organisation for at least one year. In the case of Article 3, a sample of 560 social service professionals was obtained. The data from the questionnaires were analysed using SPSS 22, also incorporating the use of STATA in some of the analyses. One-factor analysis of variance (ANOVA), t-tests for independent samples and correlation analysis were carried out by calculating Pearson's coefficient according to the scale of measurement of the variables. When statistically significant differences were found in the ANOVA test, Scheffé's post hoc test was applied to identify which pairs of means differed significantly. Pearson's correlation calculations were also performed between some of the variables. The results obtained show high average levels of both engagement and burnout both in the sample of various social professionals and in the sample of social workers only, although the latter appear somewhat less burnt out in their jobs compared to the former. There are also high levels of both harmonious passion and structural empowerment in both samples, and a mainly affective organisational commitment, although in this respect the social workers have a higher level of calculated commitment. For their part, it has been shown how the Covid-19 pandemic has greatly affected the efficiency of the way of working in social services, which was almost entirely face-to-face work, finding that people who adapted to teleworking perceived that their tasks had been more affected by the state of alarm, but in turn, people who made use of teleworking rated it more positively than those who did not make use of this medium.