• Project number: F 2462
• Institution: Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (BAuA)
• Status: Completed Project

Description:

From a social policy perspective, it is an important aim to ensure participation in working life from the time when individuals join the workforce until they reach the statutory retirement age. In this respect, attention is focussed not just on early retirement, but also on interrupted employment histories with extended episodes of sickness absence, unemployment or pension before statutory retirement age.

Health issues are frequently mentioned in the discussion about the key factors that influence the transition from active participation in work to leaving employment and taking early retirement.

This sub-project focused on indicators of work participation. The starting point was the recording of depressive symptoms in a representative sample of employees and the investigation of the association between depressive symptoms and non-participation over the following 5 years.

The indicators of work non-participation include events and duration of long-term sickness absence, unemployment and early retirement. A newly created variable was used to record whether at least one of these events occurred.

As an innovative statistical method, the two-part model was used, which first estimates the risk of an event separately and then quantifies the months due to work non-participation. 

The results show that even mild depressive symptoms have an influence on events of work non-participation, in particular on long-term sickness absence in the following five years. In the case of an event of work non-participation, the total duration of work non-participation is extended by a third for women with previous depressive symptoms, while the duration doubles for men.

The analyses of burnout (measured as emotional exhaustion) using the two-part model and the newly developed Work Ability Index scale also show the clearest effect for men and women for the occurrence and duration of long-term sickness absence. The findings on early retirement and unemployment, on the other hand, are ambiguous and heterogeneous.

All findings on the health effects relating to work participation are based on a representative initial sample of employees and a longitudinal cohort of over 2,300 respondents. The results represent an important contribution to the discussion of the social consequences of impaired mental health.