Den nye arbeidsplassen: Arbeid, helse og deltakelse i arbeidslivet. En prospektiv, longitudinell undersøkelse.

Both individual level, organization level, and society level factors participate in determining health, absence, and participation in or exit from working life. Several studies have shown that work factors contribute to health problems that are important determinants of musculoskeletal disorders, cardiovascular disease, and depression, which in turn contribute to work ability, absence, and exit from working life. Work factors contribute to the consequences of a given health problem. Knowledge of long-term effects of work factors on absence or exit from working life is lacking since there is a paucity of longitudinal studies that permit linkage of work-factor data to registries. The present project was initiated by the Norwegian Research Council to genera te knowledge of work factors (task level, group level, organization level) that influence health, attitudes to the job, (involvement, commitment, satisfaction), work ability, sickness absence, and participation in/exit from working life. The design is pro spective with several repeated measurements of both work factors and health. This provides more reliable data on exposures (independent variables) than most previous studies. One also gets information on variation over time. Several moderating or mediatin g factors (attitudes, coping strategies, motivation, job centrality) are measured, allowing the study of social and psychological mechanisms of effects. Data on work factors will be linked to registry data for objective data on absence, interventions, com pensation, and pensions. The project has recruited > 6000 participants and is currently undertaking the second survey (1st follow up). The project provides individual participating organizations with survey results and competence to do systematic improve ments by survey-feedback method.