Unemployment and psychological well-being in post Celtic Tiger Ireland

Abstract

It is well documented that unemployment has deleterious effects on psychological well-being. Ireland's high economic growth in the 1990s and early 2000s saw unemployment fall to 4%. However, since the end of the Celtic Tiger era in Ireland, the recession has been severe and unemployment high. It was hypothesised that the increase in unemployment will be accompanied by a decrease in psychological well-being. The present aim was to compare Irish employed and unemployed male and female respondents in terms of psychological well-being, and to investigate whether financial strain mediates the relationship between employment status and psychological well-being. Data were collected from a sample of 199 participants ranging in age from 18 to 64 (employed: n=100; mean age = 32.34, SD = 13.39; unemployed: n=99, mean age 35.26; SD = 11.16). The sex distribution was 57% (n=57) female and 43% (n=43) male for the employed sample, and 45.5% (n=45) female and 54.5% (n=54) male for the unemployed sample. Psychological wel...