{"title":"Impact of Flexible Work Arrangements on Key Challenges to Work Engagement Among Older Workers","authors":"Joanne Allen, F. Alpass, Á. Szabó, C. Stephens","doi":"10.1093/workar/waab010","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/workar/waab010","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 As workforces age, organizations are challenged to provide human resource management policies and practices that are responsive to the needs of older workers. Flexible work arrangements (FWAs)—practices that allow workers to influence when, where, and how work is completed—have been promoted as enabling older workers to maintain work engagement by decreasing demands of the work role, providing the autonomy to balance work and nonwork commitments, and signalling the value of workers to employers. The current study aimed to examine whether FWAs were effective in alleviating key challenges to work among older workers by assessing the impact of FWAs on the associations of physical health, mental health, and negative age-related stereotypes about older workers, with work engagement. Data were obtained from 1,834 workers aged 55–82 (age M = 63.3, 54% female) from a general random sample of older adults. Greater mental health and lower negative stereotypes predicted higher work engagement. Greater physical and mental health conveyed an indirect impact on engagement via lower perception of negative stereotypes. Greater FWAs displayed a weak negative association with the perception of negative stereotypes about older workers and reduced the association of negative stereotypes with work engagement. Access to FWAs may have a minor role in alleviating key risks to work engagement associated with mental and social challenges for an aging workforce. Considerations for future investigations of FWAs and their impact on risks to engagement among older workers are discussed.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"236 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-06-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86040219","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Early Pension Claiming and Expected Longevity: A Register-Based Study on the Take-up of the Partial Old-Age Pension in Finland","authors":"S. Nivalainen","doi":"10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB011","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB011","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 As of February 2017, Finns have been able to claim a partial old-age pension early at age 61 independent of their working hours or earnings. Focusing on the take-up of the partial old-age pension in Finland, this article investigates whether early pension claiming is associated with expected longevity. We assume parental longevity to signal expected longevity. We use total register data on those eligible to claim a partial pension at age 61 in 2018 or 2019 and link this data to the information on their parents’ birth and death dates. To our knowledge, there exists no previous register-based study that uses parental longevity to explain pension claiming behavior. Since the longevity of the same-sex parent in particular influences subjective life expectancy, the variables of interest were the same-sex parent being alive and the age (at death) of the same-sex parent. The baseline results show a negative connection between the same-sex parent being alive and claiming. The connection disappears after controlling for gender, but the negative connection between the age (at death) of the same-sex parent and the claiming remains significant in a fully adjusted model. Known risk factors for shorter longevity, such as being male, having a lower income and wealth, also increase the likelihood of claiming. The results indicate that people take their expected longevity into account when making pension claiming decisions. This may hold critical implications for actuarial neutrality, the key assumption of the pension system design, and can lead to an unexpected increase in public pension expenditure.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-06-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75024524","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Control at Work: An Integrative, Lifespan-Informed Review","authors":"R. Rauvola, C. Rudolph","doi":"10.31234/osf.io/durvz","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/durvz","url":null,"abstract":"Control is one of the most ubiquitous and fundamental concepts to the study of psychology, including to theory, research, and practice related to aging and work. Indeed, control constructs exist in many different forms (e.g., self-efficacy, job autonomy, locus of control), and they have been extensively linked to performance and well-being with age. This paper provides a review of age- and work-relevant theory and research pertaining to a variety of “actual,” perceived, and enacted control constructs. The paper seeks to fulfill three goals. First, we review predominant control constructs with respect to theory and research, considering their distinguishing and overlapping features, relationships with age- and work-relevant concerns, and areas of consensus and ambiguity. Second, we synthesize and organize our review findings into a work-focused “lifespan control framework” to guide theoretical revision, hypothesis formation, and construct choice/comparisons, and we provide recommendations to researchers for using this framework. Third and finally, we generate a focused research agenda for impactful studies of age, control, and work. The concept of control has contributed to our knowledge of and practice with work-relevant processes, and this review aims to aid in integration, organization, and innovation to move the study of age, control, and work forward.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"24 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87202215","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Assessing the Capacity to Work Among Older Workers: A Survival Analysis of Retirement Behavior","authors":"M. Boissonneault, J. de Beer","doi":"10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB008","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Whether increases to statutory retirement ages will have the anticipated effect in countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) depends on whether workers have the health capacity to postpone retirement. Methods that were proposed to measure the capacity to work at older age are ill-designed to assess inter-cohort trends, which is important for determining whether the amount of years spent retired and in good health is keeping up with increases in the statutory retirement age. We propose to measure the capacity to work as the amount of time that people would spend working if they kept working until poor health forces them to retire. We find that American workers born in 1936–1947 spent 9.4 years working between ages 55 and 69 but had the capacity to work an additional 3.3 years. We further find significant inter-cohort increases in the years spent working but insignificant ones in the years spent able to work, which might point toward a decrease in the years spent retired and in good health. Increases in the educational attainment of younger cohorts have had a positive effect on the capacity to work, but the expansion of obesity a negative one. Finally, we find similar trends among men and women as well as among Whites and non-Whites, although the capacity to work is much lower among non-Whites. Our results show the importance of considering inter-cohort changes in the capacity to work when designing policies that aim at inducing higher retirement ages.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"214 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-05-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86958081","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Quentin Brouhier, Virginie März, Sara Van Waes, I. Raemdonck
{"title":"From Isolation to Interaction: A Social Network Perspective on Older Teachers’ Position in School Organizations and Age-Related HR Practices","authors":"Quentin Brouhier, Virginie März, Sara Van Waes, I. Raemdonck","doi":"10.1093/WORKAR/WAAA031","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/WORKAR/WAAA031","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Since workforce is greying, increasing pressure has been put on many sectors, including the public sector, to raise legal retirement age. Nevertheless, older workers, and specifically teachers, usually retire much earlier. In the organizational and educational literature, most studies regarding later career have been applying a deficit perspective: reporting on senior teachers’ challenges and difficulties. Only a limited amount of studies considers senior teachers’ potentials, learning, and further career development. In this present article, we approach late-career teachers from a non-deficit perspective. This article aims to contribute to a better understanding of senior teachers at work, by analyzing HR practices that target them. Inspired by a strengths use perspective, we focus on end-of-career teachers’ knowledge and expertise exchange and their position within the school’s network. In particular, we conducted a comparative mixed-methods case study (interviews, social network analysis) in 2 secondary schools with a sample of 10 end-of-career teachers, 4 younger teachers, and 2 principals. The results illustrate that older teachers hold central positions in their workplace and have, in accordance with the socio-emotional selectivity theory, limited but strong bounds with colleagues. Moreover, school principals in both schools seem to benefit from older teachers’ organizational knowledge by involving them in decision-making processes. Nevertheless, results show that the principals in the 2 schools mainly apply remedial measures to deal with changes due to aging. This paper ends with some implications for school principals: Applying a non-deficit developmental approach is key for sustainable HR management in schools across the lifespan.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-05-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"72616905","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
J. Noone, J. Earl, C. Stephens, J. Rafalski, Joanne Allen, F. Alpass, Gabriela Topa
{"title":"An Application of the Resource-Based Dynamic Process Model in the Context of Retirement Planning","authors":"J. Noone, J. Earl, C. Stephens, J. Rafalski, Joanne Allen, F. Alpass, Gabriela Topa","doi":"10.1093/workar/waab006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/workar/waab006","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Retirement planning is a widely promoted activity to enhance wellbeing for aging populations. However, there is limited follow-up data to understand the antecedents of multi-dimensional retirement planning activities, the resources such activities produce or the explanatory mechanisms. This research draws on recent theorizing, which suggests that retirement planning may play a mediating role in explaining how pre-retirement antecedents are transformed into retirement resources. Antecedents, planning and retirement resources were examined using 3 waves of follow-up data collected in 2006, 2008, and 2014. Four hundred thirty-five people originally employed in 2008 and retired by 2014 participated in the study. Health, income, and a positive retirement attitude (T1) were the strongest predictors of retirement planning (T2), but job satisfaction and occupation also played smaller predictive roles. Financial planning (T2) predicted health, psychosocial, and financial resources in retirement (T3). However, health, lifestyle, and psychosocial planning played a minimal role in explaining retirement resources, and only financial planning demonstrated noteworthy evidence of mediation. Findings can help to inform policy decisions by identifying those at greatest risk of not planning, and to isolate the factors most likely to explain the longer-term effects of planning. Understanding which resources are predicted by different domains of planning will also help inform the targeting of interventions.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"5 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74822534","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Suggestions for Improvement in Psychometric Corrections in Meta-analysis and Implications for Research on Worker Age and Aging","authors":"In-Sue Oh, F. Schmidt","doi":"10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB001","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 As a vital tool for advancing cumulative science and guiding evidence-based practice, meta-analysis has advanced many research fields of the behavioral and social sciences, including worker age and aging. Nonetheless, there is still room for improvement, particularly in terms of meta-analytic methods and procedures. In this article, we overview some influential meta-analyses on worker age and aging concerning their psychometric correction methods and procedures, identify potential controversies and issues, and offer suggestions for improvement, particularly in corrections for two major methodological artifacts (i.e., range variation and measurement error). We also debunk some myths that both researchers and journal reviewers may encounter regarding how to conduct psychometric meta-analyses and discuss implications and agendas for future research on worker age and aging. We hope this article will help researchers in the field of age and aging and beyond to conduct a psychometric meta-analysis while harnessing the benefits of psychometric corrections and meta-analysis.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"69 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77927010","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Resource Passageways and Caravans: A Multi-level, Multi-disciplinary Review of the Antecedents of Resources over the Lifespan","authors":"Lee Sarandopoulos, P. Bordia","doi":"10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB007","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Resources are vital for older worker effectiveness and well-being, yet limited attention has been paid to the antecedents of resources. Drawing together the rich cross-disciplinary literature on resources, and through the lens of cumulative disadvantage and resource passageways, we review the individual, organizational, and institutional factors that influence the resources available to people in late working life. The review provides a more nuanced perspective on older workers as agentic actors. We highlight how agency can be constrained via a person’s resources, which are shaped by structural influences. Knowledge of structural influences on resources is important for understanding the experiences of older workers and their continued effectiveness in the work domain. We outline avenues for future research on resources and aging at work that incorporates these multi-level influences.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"78 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89660462","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Alcohol Consumption Over the Retirement Transition in Sweden: Different Trajectories Based on Education","authors":"N. Agahi, S. Kelfve, L. Hassing, M. Lindwall","doi":"10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB004","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Retirement is a major life transition that involves changes to everyday routines, roles, and habits. Previous studies suggest that retirement may influence drinking habits. Many natural inhibitors of alcohol consumption disappear with the removal of work constraints. The potential impact depends on both individual and contextual factors. Women in the cohorts undergoing retirement now have been more active on the labor market, including the occupation of higher status jobs, which indicates more financial resources as well as a larger role loss after retirement. Also, the current cohorts who retire have had more liberal drinking habits throughout their lives compared to previous cohorts. We therefore examined changes in alcohol consumption surrounding retirement in different education groups among women and men undergoing retirement using annual data from the Health, Aging and Retirement Transitions in Sweden (HEARTS) study, a longitudinal national study of 60- to 66-year-olds (n = 5,913), from 2015 to 2018. Latent growth curve models were used to estimate trajectories of alcohol consumption. Results showed that those who retired during the follow-up increased their usual weekly alcohol consumption while those who worked or were retired throughout the period had stable drinking habits. Those who were retired reported the highest alcohol consumption. The increase surrounding retirement was driven by people with higher education. Women with tertiary education and men with intermediate or tertiary education increased their weekly alcohol intake after retirement, while those with low education had unchanged drinking habits. Mechanisms and motivations that may fuel increased alcohol intake among people with higher education should be further investigated.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"13 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"84918629","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Robin Jonsson, Caroline Hasselgren, L. Dellve, D. Seldén, Daniel Larsson, M. Stattin
{"title":"Matching the Pieces: The Presence of Idiosyncratic Deals and Their Impact on Retirement Preferences Among Older Workers","authors":"Robin Jonsson, Caroline Hasselgren, L. Dellve, D. Seldén, Daniel Larsson, M. Stattin","doi":"10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/WORKAR/WAAB003","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Despite working life prolongation having been at the center of the policy agenda in Europe for the last two decades, organizations’ engagement in formal age-management activities intended to strengthen older workers’ motivation and work ability appears limited. Given policies to extend working lives, negotiated individualized work arrangements—often called idiosyncratic deals (I-deals)—can be an informal and complementary approach to formalized age-management practices, improving the person–job fit and helping older workers extend their working lives. Nevertheless, research on I-deals and retirement preferences remains scarce in the Nordic context, where collective agreements regulate conditions of employment and the employer–employee relationship. Using confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling, this study examines five areas of I-deals (i.e., Task and Work Responsibilities, Workload Reduction, Schedule Flexibility, Location Flexibility, and Financial Incentives) and their relationships with retirement preferences among Swedish public-sector employees aged 55 years or older (n = 4,499). Findings show that I-deals are generally less prevalent among women and older employees, as well as among those with poor health, in lower socioeconomic positions, and with shorter organizational tenure. Regarding retirement preferences, we found Task and Work Responsibilities to be related to later preferred retirement age, while, surprisingly, the opposite was observed for Workload Reduction, probably because individuals who received workload reductions also reported poorer health. Comparatively, factors such as matching employees’ competence, experience, and growth opportunities seem to be the most important for public-sector employees’ retirement preferences.","PeriodicalId":46486,"journal":{"name":"Work Aging and Retirement","volume":"19 1","pages":"240-255"},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74598389","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}