Studying the Relationship Between Job Enthusiasm and Job Resources in Nurses

Introduction

The emergency department in hospitals is a department where patients with emergency conditions and of all age groups go to receive treatment and urgent care. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out multiple and complex processes quickly, with quality, and effectively, which creates difficult working conditions for nursing staff [1-3]. Emergency department nurses are at a higher risk of occupational injuries than other departments. Because of the speed of operation and high pressure of work, fatigue and high stress of employees, high volume of work, and nervous pressure are more in the emergency department than in other departments [4, 5].

Recently, due to the increase in demand and the limitation of health service resources to meet these needs and the undeniable effects of the influencing factors on the human factors working in this field and on the quality of their services, it has become more prominent. In the meantime, nurses' job enthusiasm and job resources have been the focus of experts' and researchers' attention as two influential factors in increasing job satisfaction, improving performance quality, reducing job burnout, and finally improving organizational behavior [6-9].

The American National Occupational Safety and Health Association has introduced nursing as one of the top 40 occupations with a high prevalence of stress-related diseases [10]. It is essential to pay attention to job enthusiasm in line with nurses' health and in line with increasing nurses' attention and interest in the health of their colleagues and patients [11]. The origin of the concept of job passion lies in the desire to improve organizational results such as productivity and it works [10]. Job enthusiasm is defined as a positive mental state that is evolutionary and related to work, which has three components: strength, dedication, and absorption [12], or in other words, job enthusiasm refers to a positive mental state that is related to work which is determined by the power of sacrifice and attractiveness [13]. Passion for the nursing job leads to effective communication with the job, spending more energy, and creativity, and reducing errors and accidents in the job [14]. When the nurse feels useful, feels valued, and when she can use her true self without fear of negative consequences and can trust that she will not be harmed, and then she experiences psychological security [15, 16]. In recent decades, job passion has gained increasing scientific interest among researchers and researchers due to its consequences on the well-being of employees and the quality of their performance [17, 18].

Job enthusiasm is an important issue in the field of organizational behavior, which has been studied by experts and researchers due to its effects on organizational results [19, 20]. Job enthusiasm is a positive phenomenon in the work environment and the absence of negative consequences such as job burnout, mistakes, and job weakness is very significant from the point of view of preserving resources [21-23]. People with job passion have high levels of enthusiasm, energy, and self-efficacy towards their jobs. Job enthusiasm as feedback is an important variable that assists in increasing the effectiveness of the organization, and the higher the level of job enthusiasm of the employees of an organization, the effectiveness of that organization will also increase [24].

Job enthusiasm itself can be related to other variables, including the existence of job resources [4, 25]. To improve job enthusiasm in nursing, it is necessary to identify factors related to it to strengthen or correct it if necessary, among these factors, the existence of job resources can be mentioned [26]. One of the factors that can play a role in creating job enthusiasm for employees is the presence or absence of job resources [27]. Job resources refer to the social, psychological, physical, or organizational aspects of a job that may be functional in achieving job goals, reducing physiological and psychological costs related to job demands, or stimulating personal development and growth [28, 29]. Meanwhile, nurses and their employers are facing basic challenges such as high workloads, emotional demands, shift work, and lack of manpower [30].

Since the employees of the health and treatment system are considered the main capital to come to the organizational goals and the basis of providing health services to society, any change in their motivational and mental state directly affects their work efficiency. Thus, the issue of job enthusiasm in the healthcare system can be of double importance. The present study was conducted to determine job enthusiasm and its relationship with job resources in nurses working in emergency departments.

Materials and Methods

The current study was a descriptive cross-sectional correlational research that was conducted on 250 nurses working in emergency departments. To determine the sample size, a pilot study was conducted on 30 nurses. According to the minimum sample formula, 54 nurses were calculated. Considering that the sampling was done in several stages, to neutralize the variance error, twice the determined sample was considered (108 nurses). For more certainty, 250 people were considered.

Sampling in this study was done as available. The researcher visited the emergency room several times and in different shifts, and after explaining the objectives of the study and executive information about the study to the nurses whose names were randomly selected, after obtaining informed consent and considering the entry criteria for the study, they were asked to complete the questionnaires.

Inclusion criteria included work experience for at least six months in the relevant department, having a bachelor's or master's degree or higher in nursing, and consent to participate in the study. The exclusion criteria included questionnaires that had more than 20% incomplete answers.

To collect data, a three-part questionnaire of personal and social profiles of nurses, a job enthusiasm questionnaire, and a job resource questionnaire were used. Personal and social profiles of nurses included gender, marital status, age, employment status, number of children, place of work, work experience, education degree, feelings of interest in working in the emergency department, feelings of interest in nursing, and work pressure in the emergency department.

Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES) was prepared by Schaufeli in 2006 and consists of 17 questions [31]. This questionnaire includes 3 components: strength, dedication, and absorption. The items of this questionnaire are graded based on a 5-point Likert scale (completely disagree = 1 to completely agree = 5). The minimum and maximum score of this questionnaire is between 15 and 85. A higher score shows more job enthusiasm. The leveling of the scores of this questionnaire is such that a score between 17 and 34 indicates low job enthusiasm, a score between 35 and 51 shows medium job enthusiasm and a score above 51 indicates high job enthusiasm [32].

In this research, the amount of job resources was measured using the Job Resources Questionnaire introduced by Babakus et al. [33]. This scale has 14 five-choice questions, and the scoring method of this questionnaire is based on a five-point Likert scale, whose options are graded from very low (1) to very high (5) so that a score of 1 shows the lowest amount of job resources and a score of 5 shows the highest amount of job resources. This scale consists of 4 subscales including training (questions 1 to 4), appreciation (questions 5 to 7), supervisor support (questions 8 to 10), and technology support (questions 11 to 14). The range of scores is from 14 to 70, and a higher score shows more job resources. The reliability of this questionnaire was reported by Bakker to be around 0.83 by Cronbach's alpha method [34].

In this research, the opinions of 10 professors of the Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery were utilized to determine the content validity of the questionnaires. In addition, the reliability of these questionnaires was tested on 30 nurses in 12 days. Cronbach's alpha coefficient was calculated as 0.93 and 0.91 for the job enthusiasm questionnaire, and the job resources questionnaire, respectively.

SPSS version 23 software was utilized for data analysis. The data was analyzed in two sections, descriptive inferential and statistics statistics. In the descriptive statistics section, frequency and percentage, mean, and standard deviation were utilized to describe the data. In the inferential statistics section, after checking the normality of the data, Pearson's correlation coefficient was utilized to check the relationship between the variables. A p-value less than 0.05 was considered significant. Finally, the information related to 250 personnel was analyzed. It is necessary to explain that there were no incomplete and discarded questionnaires in this study.

Results and Discussion

The findings of the study revealed that the majority of the participants were married without children. In addition, in terms of employment status, the majority were official. Regarding work shifts, the majority stated that they are rotating shifts. In terms of the level of interest in the emergency department, they had an average interest. The level of interest in the nursing profession also stated that they have an average interest in their profession and reported a lot of pressure regarding the feeling of work pressure in the emergency department. Their average age was 32.77 ± 5.86 years and their average work experience was 5.48 ± 3.67 years (Table 1).

Table 1. Personal and social characteristics of nurses participating in the study.

The results also showed that job enthusiasm (50.28 ± 14.49) and job resources (34.86 ± 11.95) of nurses were at an average level (Table 2).

Table 2. Variables of job resources and job enthusiasm in emergency nurses (average total score and dimensions).

The t-test showed that the job enthusiasm of men is more than that of women and this difference is significant (Table 3). However, the statistical difference in the attitude towards job resources in men and women was not significant.

Table 3. Differences in job enthusiasm and job resources based on gender in nurses.

Pearson's test showed that the correlation between job enthusiasm and job resources in emergency nurses is significant and positive (P = 0.000, r = 0.367).

Based on Table 4, it can be said that the variance of job enthusiasm (F = 38.53) based on job resources is significant and explains 13.4% of job enthusiasm changes.

Table 4. Results of regression analysis related to the role of job resources on nurses' job enthusiasm.

Table 5 shows that the more positive the attitude towards job resources in nurses, the more likely (β = 0.367) it is for nurses to have high job enthusiasm.

Table 5. Statistical indicators and coefficients related to the prediction of job enthusiasm based on nurses' job resources.

This study aimed to determine the relationship between job motivation and job resources in nurses working in emergency departments. In this study, the average score of job enthusiasm and the amount of job resources of emergency nurses was average. The results of Tomiya's studies in Japan showed that nurses' job enthusiasm is moderate [35]. In Han's studies, the job resources of nurses are in the limit Medium has been reported [36].

The findings of the present study revealed that there is a positive and significant statistical relationship between job enthusiasm and the amount of job resources of nurses. This means that the more nurses' job resources are, the more their job passion will be. The results of studies conducted in this field indicate that job resources are directly related to the level of job enthusiasm of employees [37]. In this regard, the results of Trépanier et al.'s study [37] revealed that job passion partially mediates the relationship between job demands and participation. In addition, job passion partially mediates the relationship between job resources, job burnout, and work engagement. The results of Taştan's [38] study in Turkey showed that perceived job resources with role ambiguity, work overload, supervisor support, role conflict and job insecurity and job resources, and job independence have a significant relationship with nurses' job enthusiasm [38] Which is consistent with the findings of our study. In addition, the results of a review study by Keyko et al. [39] showed that there are 77 factors affecting job satisfaction in nursing, which consists of six categories, including job demands, personal resources, professional resources, job resources, organizational climate, and population variables. However, the findings of Beukes et al.'s [32] study revealed that job passion predicts 19% of the variance of organizational commitment and 30% of the variance of work commitment and is associated with higher levels of participation and commitment to the organization. Nurses who feel that they have a meaningful contribution to the hospital are more inclined to stay in the organization and have more job enthusiasm [32], which is relatively consistent with the findings of our study.

Some studies have also pointed out that the role of social support in strengthening job enthusiasm is strong and has an effective role [40, 41]. In this regard, the results of Orgambídez-Ramos and de Almeida's study [40] revealed that social support from colleagues increases the impact of job enthusiasm on nurses' satisfaction. They found that the climate of social support among colleagues with higher levels of job passion has a positive effect on job satisfaction, improving care quality, and decreasing the intention to leave nursing staff [40]. In addition, the results of the study of Nasurdin et al. [41] also revealed that among the three forms of social support, peer support alone has a positive and direct effect on job performance. In addition, the findings support the role of job passion as a mediator in the relationship between the 3 forms of social support and performance [41].

Conclusion

The findings of this study revealed that the job enthusiasm and job resources of nurses are at an average level, and there is a significant and positive relationship between job enthusiasm and the number of job resources of nurses working in emergency departments. This means that the job enthusiasm of nurses is directly related to the lack of job resources so their job enthusiasm increases with the increase of job resources. On the other hand, due to the lack of job resources in healthcare centers, managers and officials of healthcare centers can use the results of this study, with proper planning, and create correct training methods for managing job resources, improving job resources, and creating professional independence, and establishing justice in the use of resources by employees, take positive measures to improve nurses' job enthusiasm. In addition, due to the lack of nursing staff and the lack of job resources, by increasing the job enthusiasm of nurses, it is possible to improve the efficiency of the system and the performance of nurses.

Acknowledgments: None.

Conflict of interest: None.

Financial support: None.

Ethics statement: None.