Job stress and psychosomatic health complaints among Dutch truck drivers: a re- evaluation of Karasek's interactive job demand - control model

Abstract

Karasek's Job Demand–Control Model (JD-C Model) assumes that decision latitude (control) moderates the impact of job demands on health and well-being. It was proposed that lack of evidence for this core ‘interaction hypothesis’ was a consequence of an inadequate conceptualization of decision latitude. Taking this proposition into consideration, we re-evaluated the JD-C Model using a sample of 517 Dutch truck drivers. Regression analyses revealed a significant job demands by job control interaction effect as well as significant main effects of the two independent variables on psychosomatic health complaints. However, the magnitude of the interaction effect was very small. Therefore, it was concluded that the interaction hypothesis was not supported in the present study. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.