Sustainable working and academia

A transdisciplinary model of workaholism within Higher Education

The work from Dr. Sarah-Jane Cullinane of Trinity College Dublin, and Prof. Dr. Jennifer Hynes explores the workaholism in academia by unpacking its motivational, emotional, cognitive, and behavioural aspects.

"Reducing workaholism is an important aim for all actors in society, given the impact it has on individuals, organisations, and public health systems through chronic illnesses."

Workaholism is a negative form of working associated with numerous physical, psychological, and social implications. For example, workaholics are more prone to cardiovascular problems, depression, anxiety, and stress. Studies have also shown that workaholics take their problems home and have a negative impact on their family.

In this paper, the authors present an array of organisational and industry factors contributing to workaholism in academia. For example, academia is an occupation with an abundance of job demands, such as research, teaching, student assistance, programme design, and management, to name a few. In numerous countries, such as Australia, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States, job demands have been increasing and job resources have been reducing. Additionally, the paper takes a deeper look into micro (individual), meso (organisational), and macro (governmental) drivers of the motivational, emotional, cognitive, and behavioural aspects of workaholism.

Last but not least, the authors offer four main contributions, among which they provide recommendations to university HR departments and leaders to identify what norms exist in their institutions and explore how those norms could be drivers of workaholism.

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