Exhaustion and lack of psychological detachment from work during off-job time: Moderator effects of time pressure and leisure experiences Sabine Sonnentag University of Mannheim Hillevi Arbeus University of Konstanz Christopher Mahn University of Konstanz Charlotte Fritz Portland State University Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 19, 206-216 doi: 10.1037/a0035760 Address for Correspondence: Sabine Sonnentag Department of Psychology School of Social Sciences University of Mannheim Schloss Ehrenhof Ost D-68131 Mannheim Phone: +49 621 181 2118 Fax: +49 621 181 2119 Email: [email protected] Exhaustion and lack of detachment 2 Abstract Lack of psychological detachment from work during off-job time contributes to the increase in employee exhaustion over time. This study examines the reverse causal path from exhaustion to lack of psychological detachment, suggesting that this reverse process may operate within a relatively short time frame. Specifically, we examine if exhaustion predicts a decrease in psychological detachment from work during off-job time within several weeks. We propose that time pressure at work intensifies and that positive leisure experiences reduce this association between exhaustion and the decrease in psychological detachment. We tested our hypotheses in a short-term prospective study (time lag: 4 weeks) with a sample of 109 employees. Ordinary least square regression analysis indicates that exhaustion predicted a decrease in psychological detachment from work over the course of four weeks. This decrease was particularly strong for employees working under time pressure and for employees who did not engage in pleasurable leisure experiences. Our findings suggest that exhausted employees find detachment from work increasingly difficult and therefore might suffer from insufficient recovery – although they need it most. The situation is particularly severe when exhausted employees face high time pressure and a lack of pleasurable leisure experiences. Keywords: exhaustion, psychological detachment, time pressure, leisure, longitudinal ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 3 Exhaustion and lack of psychological detachment from work during off-job time: Moderator effects of time pressure and leisure experiences Research has demonstrated that not only job stressors but also experiences during offjob time impact on employee health and well-being (Amstad, Meier, Fasel, Elfering, & Semmer, 2011; Hecht & Boies, 2009). Employees who are able to unwind and recover from job stress during off-job hours enjoy a better health and well-being than employees who are less able to do so (Demerouti, Bakker, Geurts, & Taris, 2009; Sonnentag & Fritz, 2007). Psychological detachment from work during off-job time (i.e., temporary mental disengagement from one’s job; Sonnentag & Bayer, 2005) has been identified as one particularly important recovery experience. Therefore, it is important to better understand the antecedents of psychological detachment from work during off-job time. Cross-sectional studies have shown that lack of psychological detachment from work during off-job time is related to increased levels of burnout, particularly emotional exhaustion (Fritz, Yankelevich, Zarubin, & Barger, 2010; Siltaloppi, Kinnunen, & Feldt, 2009). Moreover, prospective research has demonstrated that a lack of psychological detachment predicts an increase in exhaustion over time (Söderström, Jeding, Ekstedt, Perski, & Akerstedt, 2012; Sonnentag, Binnewies, & Mojza, 2010), suggesting that a lack of psychological detachment might be one of the causal precursors of exhaustion. However, an opposite causal path might be possible as well. Specifically, employees experiencing exhaustion might find it increasingly difficult to psychologically detach from work during off-job time, for instance because they remain mentally occupied with stressful job-related matters during off-job hours. This impact of exhaustion on psychological detachment might be particularly strong under specific conditions, for instance when job demands (e.g., time pressure) are high and when leisure time does not provide sufficient ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 4 opportunities for recovery. In this study, we examine this reversed causal path from exhaustion to poor psychological detachment and explore possible moderators of this process. Our study makes several contributions to the literature. First, it adds to past research on employee burnout. Specifically, we propose that exhaustion might not only be regarded as a consequence of unfavorable working conditions and lack of recovery from work (Crawford, LePine, & Rich, 2010; Sonnentag et al., 2010). It can also be seen as a state that stimulates harmful action and thinking patterns that subsequently trigger further depletion processes. Thus, from a Conversation-of-Resources perspective (Hobfoll, 1998), exhaustion can be seen as a crucial part of a loss cycle: exhaustion as a state of drained resources might lead to further resource depletion, which over time might increase exhaustion even further. Second, our study contributes to the growing number of studies on recovery from work. While these earlier studies have demonstrated the benefits of recovery (and particularly of psychological detachment from work; Sonnentag et al., 2010; von Thiele Schwarz, 2011), the antecedents of beneficial recovery experiences have received less research attention so far. Thus, still little is known about the individual predictors of psychological detachment. Our study shows that an individual’s level of exhaustion may make psychological detachment from work during off-job time increasingly difficult and thereby may prevent an effective recovery process. Finally, our study points to possible moderators of the relationship between high exhaustion and decreased psychological detachment. It specifies situations in which exhausted employees might be especially at risk of not detaching from work during off-job time. By identifying such moderators our study identifies possible entry points for interventions that may help employees who suffer from exhaustion to find ways to mentally disengage from work while being at home. It has been argued that the choice of time lags is a particularly challenging issue in prospective research (Mitchell & James, 2001). Previous studies in occupational health ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 5 psychology mostly incorporated time lags of several months or more (Sonnentag & Frese, 2012) or followed a daily-survey design with time lags of a few hours within one day (Sonnentag & Bayer, 2005; Ten Brummelhuis & Bakker, 2012). However, studies examining time lags of several weeks are relatively rare (e.g., Totterdell, Wood, & Wall, 2006). With our study, we aim at addressing this paucity of research and chose a time lag of four weeks. A time lag of four weeks will be particularly suitable to examine the relationship between exhaustion and change in psychological detachment, for several reasons. First, it is long enough to capture changes in a person’s experiences that go beyond short-term day-to-day fluctuations, but is still short enough to reflect relatively small changes in affect and behavior – as an expression of employees’ effort to deal with the demands at work (Zaheer, Albert, & Zaheer, 1999). Shorter time-lags may fall short in reliably detecting changes in psychological detachment because these changes may be masked by day-to-day fluctuations and because for a limited time, exhausted employees may try to counteract detachment difficulties by recuperation efforts during the weekend. Over time, however, this effort will not be sufficient to uphold a healthy “cycle of work and rest” (Zijlstra & Rook, 2008, p. 62) and detachment levels will decrease. Second, during time lags that are substantially longer than four weeks, exhausted employees may try to initiate more enduring changes to their situation (LeBlanc, Hox, Schaufeli, Taris, & Peeters, 2007), might find some temporary relief during vacations (Westman & Eden, 1996), or might mentally withdraw from their jobs (Bakker, Demerouti, Verbeke, 2004). Finally, a four-week time lag is advantageous for more practical reasons because re-occurring monthly obligations and other events in employees’ work and private lives can be held constant. Taken together, we expect that this time interval reflects the time during which exhausted employees find it more and more difficult to mentally disengage from job-related issues during off-job time - before they ultimately may decide to develop turnover intentions and behavioral signs of withdrawal from their jobs (Taris, Le Blanc, Schaufeli, & Schreurs, 2005). ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 6 Exhaustion as a predictor of poor psychological detachment Exhaustion has been described as the core component of burnout. It is experienced as „being overextended and depleted of one’s emotional and physical resources“ (Maslach, Schaufeli, & Leiter, 2001, p. 399). Exhaustion results from the prolonged exposure to high job demands (Bakker & Demerouti, 2007) and can manifest itself in the emotional, physical, and cognitive domain (Demerouti, Mostert, & Bakker, 2010). As a component of burnout, exhaustion results from chronic depletion processes (Shirom, 2003) and is relatively stable over longer periods of time. For instance, Hall, Dollard, Tuckey, Winefield, and Thompson (2010) reported a stability of r = .69 over the course of 12 months. We propose that exhaustion predicts a decrease in psychological detachment from work over time. Etzion, Eden, and Lapidot (1998) have introduced the concept of psychological detachment in research on respites and recovery. Psychological detachment refers to temporary mental disengagement from one’s job during off-job hours. It implies refraining from job-related thoughts and worries during leisure time. Psychological detachment may be achieved by refraining from job-related activities (Sonnentag & Bayer, 2005), and by engaging in activities that require mental presence and that encourage a high involvement in the activity (Feuerhahn, Sonnentag, & Woll, 2014; Hahn, Binnewies, & Haun, 2012). Research has shown that psychological detachment from work may change within a few weeks, for instance when deliberately addressed in an intervention program (Hahn, Binnewies, Sonnentag, & Mojza, 2011), demonstrating its malleability within a relatively short period of time. Traditionally, research has conceptualized a lack of psychological detachment from work – along with related constructs such as rumination and worry – as a predictor of poor health and well-being (Sonnentag et al., 2010; Verkuil, Brosschot, Meerman, & Thayer, 2010). Exhaustion has been mainly seen as a result of enduring stressful working conditions and lack of resources (Crawford et al., 2010; Demerouti et al., 2001; Halbesleben, 2006). However, the ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 7 assumption that exhaustion is a predictor of a person’s future thoughts and behaviors has received less research attention within occupational health psychology. In our study, we examine this “reverse process” and propose that exhaustion can predict a decrease in psychological detachment over time. Exhaustion might lead to a decrease in psychological detachment for several reasons. First, exhaustion implies a depletion of one’s energetic resources; it is experienced as a lack of energy and is closely related to feelings of fatigue (Maslach et al., 2001; Shirom, 2003). When employees are exhausted they feel increasingly overwhelmed by the demands of their jobs and think that they are unable to meet these demands with the energetic resources they have available. Therefore, for employees high in exhaustion, job demands are not any longer challenges they may embrace, but become a source of stress and worry. Second, studies have shown that exhausted employees report cognitive weariness (Melamed, Ugarten, Shirom, Kahana, Lerman, & Froom, 1999) and more failures with respect to perception, memory, and action (van der Linden, Keijsers, Eling, & van Schaijk, 2005; Schmidt, Neubach & Heuer, 2007) resulting in a tendency to show poor job performance (Taris, 2006). These performance deficits may increase over time because exhausted employees will become less and less able to invest extra effort in order to compensate for these deficits. As a result, exhausted employees may increasingly ruminate about their work or try to complete work-related tasks after hours. For example, they may think more and more about mistakes they have made or about possible issues that may arise in the future. Third, research has shown that exhaustion is associated with self-control deficits (Bolton, Harvey, Grawitch, & Barber, 2012; Diestel & Schmidt, 2011). These self-control deficits imply that exhausted employees are less capable to actively regulate their thoughts and emotions. For instance, exhausted employees have problems in directing their attention (van der Linden et al., 2005) what makes it difficult for them to leave thoughts about their work behind during off-job time. Initially, exhausted employees might try to counteract such self-control problems by investing extra effort, what ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 8 in turn further depletes their self-control capacity. As a consequence psychological detachment from work will further decrease. Taken together, findings on exhaustion, depletion of energetic resources, and associated performance problems imply that, over time, exhausted employees will become less able to mentally detach from work during off-job time. In addition, because their selfcontrol is impaired they will become less successful in influencing their thoughts during leisure time. Thus, while in a process that unfolds over years, exhaustion may lead to disengagement from the demands of work (Lee & Ashforth, 1996), within shorter time periods, exhausted employees might still want to remain engaged, but in fact will be less able to mentally detach from work during off-job time. Therefore, we propose the following hypothesis: Hypothesis 1. Exhaustion predicts a decrease in psychological detachment from work during off-job time over several weeks. Time Pressure and Pleasurable Leisure Experiences as Moderators We propose that both work-related and leisure-related factors might impact on the relationship between exhaustion and decreased psychological detachment. Specifically, time pressure at work may intensify the relationship between exhaustion and decreased psychological detachment, whereas pleasurable leisure experiences may reduce it. Time pressure is a wide-spread job stressor and refers to the experience of having too much to do in too little time (Major, Klein, Ehrhart, 2002). Research has shown that employees who work under high time pressure and face high workload find it more difficult to mentally detach from work during off-job time (Siltaloppi et al, 2009; Sonnentag, Kuttler, & Fritz, 2010). One explanation for this finding is that time pressure goes along with high activation (Baer & Oldham, 2006), i.e., an intense physiological and psychological stimulation, and may persist after the end of the working day, even when the actual time ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 9 pressure is over. This high level of activation makes it difficult to unwind and to forget about work during off-job time (Brosschot, Pieper, & Thayer, 2005). Importantly, time pressure might not only directly impair psychological detachment from work but might also be a moderator in the relationship between exhaustion and low psychological detachment. Specifically, time pressure may intensify the relationship between exhaustion and decreased detachment. Above we have argued that exhausted employees feel that their energetic resources are not sufficient to deal with the demands of their jobs. This experience should be particularly strong when workload is high and when employees face time pressure. When exhausted employees face time pressure, their fear that they will not be able to meet the demands of their jobs will increase and they will worry even more about work during off-job time, resulting in a particularly strong decrease in psychological detachment. Thus, we propose that high time pressure intensifies the relationship between exhaustion and decreased psychological detachment. However, when time pressure is low, work demands appear to be more easily manageable and employees will disconnect from work more easily and will think less about work during off-job time. In this situation, the relationship between exhaustion and decrease in psychological detachment should be weaker. Thus, we propose the following hypothesis: Hypothesis 2. Time pressure moderates the relationship between exhaustion and decrease in psychological detachment from work during off-job time. At high levels of time pressure the relationship between exhaustion and decrease in psychological detachment is stronger than at low levels of time pressure. Pleasurable experiences during off-job time may impact on the relationship between exhaustion and decreased psychological detachment. Specifically, we propose that pleasurable leisure experiences have the potential to buffer the relationship between exhaustion and decrease in psychological detachment. Pleasurable leisure experiences refer to the individual perception that the way one spends time off the job is a pleasurable and positive ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 10 one (cf., Sonnentag & Zijlstra, 2006). This perception originates from engaging in activities that one enjoys doing and that are associated with positive affective states. Empirically, it has been shown that pleasure during off-job time predicts a decrease in fatigue and an increase in vigor (van Hooff, Geurts, Beckers, & Kompier, 2011). We propose that pleasurable leisure experiences are important for exhausted employees in that they may help them mentally disengage from work during off-job time. We have argued that exhaustion is related to a decrease in psychological detachment from work; exhausted employees find it increasingly difficult to mentally detach from work because work becomes less manageable for them and because self-control deficits make it increasingly difficult to stop thinking about work. However, when exhausted employees have pleasurable experiences during leisure time they may be more successful in psychologically detaching from work. Pleasurable leisure experiences are by definition experiences with positive valence that may result from enjoyable activities. Pursuing an enjoyable activity may make it more likely to get immersed and absorbed in it, which in turn will result in higher levels of psychological detachment from work (Hahn et al., 2012). Moreover, pleasurable leisure experiences are associated with positive affective states (Sonnentag & Zijlstra, 2006). Positive affective states help to restore depleted self-control resources (Tice, Baumeister, Shmueli, & Muravan, 2007). Thus, being in a positive affective state during leisure time will help exhausted employees to disentangle themselves from unwanted thoughts during off-job time, thereby increasing psychological detachment from work. However, when employees do not engage in pleasurable leisure experiences, exhaustion will be associated with a decrease in psychological detachment from work during off-job hours. Exhausted employees will be left with their thoughts originating from the overwhelming work situation. Building on these arguments, we propose Hypothesis 3: Hypothesis 3. Pleasurable leisure experiences moderate the relationship between exhaustion and decrease in psychological detachment from work during off-job time. At high ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 11 levels of pleasurable leisure experiences the negative relationship between emotional exhaustion and psychological detachment is weaker than at low levels of pleasurable leisure experiences. Method Sample We recruited study participants employed in a broad range of jobs and working at least 20 hours per week. We recruited potential participants in a variety of organizations mostly in Southwest Germany. Specifically, we approached local organizations, either via the their human resource department or via contact persons, and introduced the study at the phone or in face-to-face meetings. After organizations expressed interest in study participation, we informed them about the details of data collection. Specifically, we had prepared a one-page description of the study that could be provided to potential participants, explaining the study procedure, inclusion criteria, and assuring confidentiality of all responses. We asked participants to respond to two surveys administered four weeks apart. We distributed 229 surveys. A total of 161 persons completed the first survey (response rate: 70.3 percent), and a total of 121 persons completed the second survey. On both surveys, participants reported a self-generated code that allowed us to match the Time 1 and Time 2 surveys from 109 participants, for an effective retention rate of 67.7 percent. We tested if persons who participated only at Time 1 differed systematically from those participating at both measurement occasions. These two groups of participants did not differ on any of our study variables. Our final sample included 109 employees (60.6 percent women). Mean age was 35.9 years (SD = 9.2). Average professional experience was 14.2 years (SD = 10.2), tenure on the specific job was 6.8 years (SD = 6.5). Our sample was fairly well educated with 46.2 percent having completed 2 to 3 years of professional training, 14.2 percent had advanced professional training, and 34.0 percent had a university degree; a minority in our sample (5.7 ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 12 percent) had no formal professional training. Participants came from a broad range of occupational backgrounds, including mainly administrative (34.9 percent), technical (15.6 percent), and managerial (11.9 percent) jobs. About one third (37.6 percent) of the sample had children. Measures Table 1 shows the means, standard deviation, and zero-order correlations between study variables. All items were in German. Psychological detachment. We assessed our core outcome variable at Time 2 with four items of the Recovery Experience Questionnaire (Sonnentag & Fritz, 2007). A sample item is “During non-work time, I forget about work.” Participants responded to the items on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = I fully disagree; 5 = I fully agree). Cronbach’s alpha was .88. Exhaustion. At Time 1 we measured exhaustion with 7 exhaustion items from the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory (OLBI; Demerouti, Bakker, Nachreiner, & Schaufeli, 2001). Sample items are “At my work, I feel increasingly drained emotionally”, “After my work, I usually feel worn out and weary.” Again, as response format we used a 5-point Likert scale (1 = I fully disagree; 5 = I fully agree). Cronbach’s alpha was .78. Time pressure. For assessing time pressure at Time 1 we used the five items from the Instrument for Stress-Related Job Analysis (Semmer, 1984; Zapf, 1993), a measure that has been widely used in earlier research (e.g., Garst, Frese, & Fay, 2000). A sample item is “How often do you face time pressure?”. Participants reported their responses on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = very rarely or never; 5 = very often). Cronbach’s alpha was .74. Pleasurable leisure experiences. We measured pleasurable leisure experiences at Time 1 with four items, beginning with “During my free time…”, “…I pursue activities that bring me joy”, “… I engage in activities that I like doing”, “… I do things that cheer me up”, “… I devote myself to enjoyable things”. Participants answered the items on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = I fully disagree; 5 = I fully agree). Cronbach’s alpha was .87. ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 13 Control variables. As control variables we assessed psychological detachment at Time 1, work hours, and emotional stability. We included psychological detachment at Time 1 in order to capture change in psychological detachment potentially due to levels of exhaustion and its interactions with time pressure and pleasurable leisure experiences. We controlled for work hours because long work hours might be associated with exhaustion (Shirom, Nirel, Vinokur, 2010) and poor psychological detachment (Sanz-Vergel, Demerouti, Bakker, & Moreno-Jiménez, 2011; Siltaloppi et al., 2009). We included emotional stability because earlier work has shown that low emotional stability – i.e. the tendency to experience negative emotions such as anger or anxiety - may be related to exhaustion (Alarcon, Eschleman, & Bowling, 2009) as well as a lack of psychological detachment from work during off-hours (Kühnel, Sonnentag, & Westman, 2009; Sonnentag et al., 2010).1 Specifically, we assessed psychological detachment at Time 1 with the same four items as used at Time 2. Cronbach’s alpha was .89. We assessed work hours with a single item directly asking about the number of hours participants worked per week. We assessed emotional stability with twelve items of the German version (Borkenau & Ostendorf, 1993) of the NEO FFI (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Cronbach’s alpha was .84. Confirmatory factor analyses. To examine if the constructs assessed at Time 1 were distinct, we computed confirmatory factor analyses. In a model with five factors (exhaustion, time pressure, pleasurable leisure, psychological detachment, and emotional stability) with all items loading on their respective factors (χ2 = 763.966, df = 454, (χ2/df ratio = 1.68), all factor loading were highly significant. Importantly, this 5-factor model fit the data better than the best-fitting 4-factor model with pleasurable leisure and psychological detachment loading on one common factor (χ2 = 978.886, df = 458, Δχ2 = 214.92, Δdf = 4, p < .001), the best-fitting 3-factor model with exhaustion, pleasurable leisure, and psychological detachment loading on one common factor (χ2 = 1233.306, df = 461, Δχ2 = 469.33, Δdf = 7, p < .001), the best-fitting 2-factor model with exhaustion, time pressure pleasurable leisure, and psychological ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 14 detachment loading on a first, and emotional stability loading on a second factor (χ2 = 1409.535, df = 463, Δχ2 = 645.569, Δdf = 9, p < .001), and a one-factor model (χ2 = 1813.850, df = 464, Δχ2 = 1049.884, Δdf = 10, p < .001). This analysis demonstrates that the five measures assessed at Time 1 represent empirically distinct constructs. Results Test of Hypotheses We tested our hypotheses using ordinary least square regression analyses. In Step 1, we entered emotional stability, work hours, and psychological detachment from work during off-job time at Time 1 as control variables. Because we controlled for psychological detachment at Time 1, the other variables entered into the regression model refer to the prediction of change in psychological detachment at Time 2. In Step 2, we entered exhaustion at Time 1 as our core predictor variable. In Step 3, we entered the two moderators, time pressure and pleasurable leisure experiences. In Step 4, we included the interaction terms between the two moderators and exhaustion. Table 2 shows the results. From the control variables entered in Step 1 only psychological detachment at Time 1 was significant. It was a strong positive predictor of psychological detachment at Time 2, reflecting a substantial stability in employees’ general tendency to psychologically detach from work during off-job time. Entering exhaustion in Step 2 contributed to the prediction of psychological detachment at Time 2. Employees who experienced high levels of exhaustion assessed at Time 1 reported a decrease in psychological detachment at Time 2; in other words, over the four-week study period their detachment levels dropped relative to their detachment levels that one would have expected from their detachment levels at Time 1. This finding provides support for Hypothesis 1. Neither time pressure nor pleasurable leisure experiences entered in Step 3 were significant predictors of psychological detachment at Time 2. When entering the interaction terms in Step 4, explained variance further increased. Both interaction terms were significant. To explore these ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 15 interaction effects further, we computed simple slope tests using the computational tool provided by Preacher, Curran, and Bauer (2006). For time pressure as moderator, the simple slope was negative and significant for high levels of time pressure (+1 SD, β = -0.466; SE = 0.146, t = -3.20, p < .01), but not for low levels of time pressure (-1 SD, β = 0.037; SE = 0.151, t = 0.24, ns). Thus, when employees had high time pressure at work, exhaustion was associated with a decrease in psychological detachment over time. However, when time pressure was low, exhaustion did not predict a change in psychological detachment over time (Figure 1). This pattern of findings is in line with Hypothesis 2. For pleasurable leisure experiences as the moderator the opposite pattern emerged: At low levels of pleasurable leisure experiences (-1 SD), exhaustion was related to a decrease in psychological detachment over time (β = -0.446; SE = 0.120, t = -3.73, p < .001). At high levels of pleasurable leisure experiences (+1 SD), exhaustion was not related to a change in psychological detachment (β = -0.059; SE = 0.089, t = -0.66, ns; Figure 2). Although the direction of the slopes is in line with the prediction made in Hypothesis 3, the exact pattern does not correspond to the rationale underlying Hypothesis 3. Employees with low levels of exhaustion and low levels of pleasurable leisure experiences showed the biggest change in detachment. Additional Analysis: Test for Reverse Causation To arrive at a more complete picture about the interrelations between exhaustion and psychological detachment over the four-week period, we also tested for reverse causation. We conducted an ordinary least square regression analysis with exhaustion at Time 2 as outcome variable. Similar to our procedure when testing the hypotheses, we entered emotional stability, work hours, and exhaustion at Time 1 as control variables in Step 1. In Step 2, we entered psychological detachment at Time 1 as main predictor variable of interest. To explore the role time pressure and pleasurable leisure experiences, we entered these two variables in Step 3 and included the interaction terms between time pressure and psychological detachment, and between pleasurable leisure experiences and psychological detachment in Step 4. As shown in ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 16 Table 3, exhaustion at Time 1 was a strong predictor of exhaustion at Time 2. Psychological detachment at Time 1 did not predict exhaustion at Time 2. Neither the main effects of time pressure and pleasurable leisure experiences nor the interaction terms were significant. Results remain unchanged in a further analysis when not controlling for emotional stability or work hours.2 Discussion Our study showed that exhaustion predicts a decrease in psychological detachment over the course of four weeks. Employees who felt exhausted reported having a harder time mentally disengaging from work during off-job time. Time pressure and pleasurable leisure experiences moderated this association between exhaustion and decrease in psychological detachment. Exhaustion was related to a decrease in psychological detachment from work during off-job time when time pressure was high, but not when time pressure was low. Thus, time pressure can be seen as a factor that increases the risk that employees high in exhaustion do not benefit sufficiently from their leisure time. Pleasurable leisure experiences showed a significant interaction effect with exhaustion – albeit the pattern differed from the one we had expected. It is important to note that exhaustion predicted change in psychological detachment. This finding suggests that exhausted employees do not just find it difficult at the very moment to mentally detach from work during off-job time – as becomes obvious in the concurrent zero-order correlations. Importantly, exhaustion is associated with a decline in detachment over time. The tendency of exhausted employees to stay increasingly connected to their work during off-job time instead of detaching could be seen as a coping attempt (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984). Not detaching implies to think about work-related issues, for instance trying to come up with solutions for pressing problems or difficulties. The finding that time pressure increases the association between exhaustion and decreased psychological detachment is in line with this interpretation: particularly when time pressure is high, exhausted employees ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 17 might perceive a necessity to come up with a solution for this stressful situation and will continue thinking about work as a coping attempt during off-job time. Our finding that exhaustion predicts a decrease in psychological detachment from work may appear to contradict findings from other studies that showed a positive association between exhaustion and withdrawal symptoms such as absenteeism and turnover intentions (Lee & Ashforth, 1996; Ybema, Smulders, & Bongers, 2010). It might be that exhausted employees wish to withdraw from their work at the behavioral level as the exhaustion process proceeds; but nevertheless they are not successful in withdrawing mentally from work during off-job time. One might even speculate that exhausted employees’ intention to withdraw at the behavioral level reflects an attempt to gain distance to the demands of work because they fail in mentally detaching from work during off-job time. With respect to time pressure, past research has seen time pressure mainly as a predictor of exhaustion (Bakker & Demerouti, 2007). Our study adds an additional perspective: When time pressure persists once employees have developed the first exhaustion symptoms – which may be the case in many work settings – the situation will further deteriorate: time pressure hinders exhausted employees from mentally detaching from work during off-job time. However, detachment is important for employee well-being and performance capacity. Our study provides new insights into the role of pleasurable leisure experiences. Whereas earlier research has mainly looked at the main effect of positive and pleasurable experiences during leisure time (Sonnentag & Zijlstra, 2006; van Hooff et al., 2011), the present study illustrates an interaction effect between exhaustion and pleasurable leisure experiences. When employees have pleasurable leisure experiences, exhaustion does not predict a change in psychological detachment. When employees lack pleasurable leisure experiences, exhaustion and change in psychological detachment were negatively related. The pattern of this interaction effect is interesting: as predicted, when exhausted employees do not ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 18 experience pleasurable leisure, psychological detachment decreases. However, when employees with low exhaustion levels do not experience pleasurable leisure, psychological detachment increases. Not experiencing pleasurable leisure might be an indicator of experiencing social conflicts at home or of facing financial problems. Social conflicts and financial problems might distract from one’s job and thereby increase psychological detachment in employees who are not exhausted because they can focus their attention on the problematic situation at home that needs to be resolved. Exhausted employees, however, will be less able to detach from work even when facing problems in the home domain because they are less able to deliberately direct their attention (van der Linden, et al., 2007). Our test of reverse relationships indicates that lack of psychological detachment did not predict change in exhaustion over the course of four weeks. This result is in contrast to earlier findings with longer time lags that found that lack of psychological detachment predicted an increase in exhaustion (Sonnentag et al., 2010). In our study, exhaustion was rather stable over the four-week time period (r = .78). Similarly, using longitudinal data with multiple time lags of six months, Dunford, Shipp, Boss, Angermeier, and Boss (2012) found exhaustion to be relatively stable over such a period of time in employees who do not undergo major job changes. In line with earlier research on burnout (e.g., Hall et al., 2010), these findings from Dunford and his colleagues suggest that changes in exhaustion develop over longer periods of time. Therefore, it is no surprise that our study with the rather short time lag of four weeks did not find a lagged relationship between lack of detachment and increase in exhaustion, whereas earlier research with a longer time lag did find such a lagged relationship. Possibly, the speed of the two underlying causal processes that link exhaustion with psychological detachment (i.e., from exhaustion to a decreased detachment versus from low detachment to increased exhaustion) differ: Specifically, not detaching from work during offjob time might be a rather short-term reaction to feelings of exhaustion, whereas it takes longer until lack of detachment translates into higher levels of exhaustion. In terms of ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 19 Conservation of Resources Theory (Hobfoll, 1998), this process might reflect a typical loss cycle: being exhausted leads to poor psychological detachment. Poor psychological detachment in turn indicates that no full recovery has occurred and resources cannot be restored. Lack of resources in turn implies that work is experienced as even more demanding, subsequently resulting in increased levels of exhaustion. It is important to note that several parts of the loss cycle might operate within different time frames. In addition, it might be that some parts of the cycle can be influenced more easily than others. For instance, within a shorter time frame, it might be easier to increase psychological detachment by a deliberate change in everyday activities (e.g., ten Brummelhuis & Bakker, 2012) than it is to reduce a person’s level of exhaustion. Our results further indicated that neither time pressure nor pleasurable leisure experiences predicted change in psychological detachment over time, although both variables showed significant concurrent relationships with psychological detachment at both measurement occasions. Possibly, both, time pressure and lack of pleasurable leisure experiences have an immediate impact on psychological detachment. For instance, time pressure during the workday might lead to high levels of activation at night making psychological detachment difficult. This process might repeat itself over a longer period of time resulting in an equilibrium-type condition (Mitchell & James, 2001), so that no further effect of time pressure on psychological detachment can be detected. Limitations and Directions for Future Research As most research, our study has some limitations. For example, we used self-reports to measure our key study variables, stimulating concerns about common method variance (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003). We addressed those concerns by using a prospective design that allowed us to separate the assessments of our predictor and outcome variables. Moreover, we controlled for emotional stability thereby reducing the likelihood that our findings can be explained by a general response bias. In addition, it has to be noted that ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 20 common method bias is more of a threat when testing main effects as opposed to interaction effects (Siemsen, Roth, & Oliviera, 2010). However, in our study, using self-report measures leaves an important question unanswered: is it the objective time pressure that moderates the relationship between exhaustion and low psychological detachment or is it the perception of time pressure? It might be that exhausted employees overestimate the amount of time pressure they are facing because they feel that they do not have enough energy resources to deal with their demands at work. Although our measure of time pressure aims at minimizing subjective response bias by asking about the objective situation – and not one’s reaction to it (Semmer, Grebner, & Elfering, 2004), future studies may want to disentangle the potential influence of objective stressors and more subjective appraisal processes. We deliberately choose a relatively short time lag of four weeks for our prospective analysis. This decision implies that our study is mute about processes they might unfold over shorter (e.g., two weeks) or longer (e.g., two or three months) periods of time. Future research may explore this question by systematically varying the time lags between several measurement occasions in order to identify the time period that best reflects when exhaustion results in a subsequent decrease in psychological detachment, and low levels of detachment result in increased levels of exhaustion (cf. Meier & Spector, 2013, for a similar approach). In our study, we focused on time pressure and pleasurable leisure experiences as two possible moderators between exhaustion and psychological detachment. It remains an open question to be addressed in future research if our findings generalize to other job stressors and if other factors on or off the job might protect exhausted employees from ending in a situation where they become unable to mentally disengage from work during off-job time. For instance, a high level of mindfulness might help employees stay mentally focused on the moment once they leave their workplace at the end of the workday (Hülsheger, Alberts, Feinhold, & Lang, 2013), what in turn might facilitate psychological detachment from work. ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 21 When developing our hypotheses we have argued that psychological detachment of exhausted employees may decrease over time because exhausted employees may ruminate and worry about work. We have to note, however, that in conceptual terms, lack of psychological detachment is distinct from worry and rumination - although the concepts are substantially related (Flaxman, Ménard, Bond, & Kinman, 2012; Querstret & Cropley, 2012). Future studies may want to explicitly examine worry and rumination as the mechanisms underlying the relationship between exhaustion and decreased psychological detachment. Although using a prospective design, our study still sketches only a rather rough picture about the processes that link exhaustion, time pressure, leisure experiences, and psychological detachment. Future studies may take a much more fine-grained approach and assess in detail how exhausted and non-exhausted employees structure their work day, respond to time pressure, spend their leisure time, and how they think about work when being on and off the job. To examine these questions, experience sampling or daily diary study designs would be most appropriate (Fisher & To, 2012; Sonnentag, Binnewies, & Ohly, 2013). Practical implications Previous research demonstrated that in the long run employee well-being benefits from mentally disengaging from work during off-job time (Sonnentag et al., 2010; van Thiele Schwarz, 2010). Therefore, employees should be encouraged to psychologically detach from work when off the job. This study showed that employees who are already exhausted fail to detach from work, particularly when they are facing time pressure at work and when they do not engage in pleasurable leisure experiences. To increase psychological detachment from work in exhausted employees, it is important to address time pressure at work and enable replenishing leisure experiences. With respect to time pressure at work, supervisors may want to limit the workload and time pressure of employees who are running the risk of becoming exhausted. For instance, supervisors might want to refrain from assigning time-sensitive tasks with strict deadlines to exhaustion-prone employees. For this purpose, developing a good ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 22 leader-employee relationship is crucial (Thomas & Lankau, 2009). A second – and often more realistic – approach might be to support employees in dealing with the time pressure they are actually facing. Such an approach should include several steps, such as addressing appraisal processes, teaching time-management skills, helping set priorities, and training substantive skills that help employees complete their work in a more efficient way (e.g., Arthur, Bennett, Edens, & Bell, 2003; Green & Skinner, 2005). Pleasurable leisure provided a relative benefit for exhausted employees while it was less advantageous for non-exhausted employees. Therefore, exhaustion-prone employees should be encouraged to spend their off-job time in a way that helps them to prevent further depletion of their scarce energy resources. In addition to pleasurable leisure experiences, rest and relaxation might be particularly important. ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 23 References Alcaron, G., Eschleman, K. J., & Bowling, N. A. (2009). Relationships between personality variables and burnout: A meta-analysis. Work & Stress, 23, 244-263. Amstad, F. T., Meier, L. L., Fasel, U., Elfering, A., & Semmer, N. K. 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Clegg (Eds.), Time in organizations: Approaches and methods (pp. 6279). London: Routledge. ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 31 Footnote! 1 Researchers have criticized the inclusion of negative affectivity and related constructs (i.e., low emotional stability) as control variables (Spector & Brannick, 2011). To rule out that our findings are driven by the fact that we controlled for emotional stability, we computed our analyses also without emotional stability. Results remain unchanged. 2 In addition, used a structural-equation modeling approach (implemented in Mplus 6.1) to test if the path from exhaustion at Time 1 to detachment at Time 2 differed from the path from detachment at Time 1 to exhaustion at Time 2. In this model we specified the stabilities of detachment and exhaustion explicitly, and included work hours as a control variable. To keep the model parsimonious, we omitted the moderator variables. A model in which the paths from exhaustion at Time 1 to detachment at Time 2 and from detachment at Time 1 to exhaustion at Time 2 were freely estimated showed a good fit (χ2 = 0.192, df = 1, ns) and the path from exhaustion at Time 1 to detachment at Time 2 was significant, whereas the path from detachment at Time 1 to exhaustion at Time 2 was not. Overall these findings mirror the results of the multiple-regression analyses. In a model in which we constrained the paths from exhaustion at Time 1 to detachment at Time 2 and from detachment at Time 1 to exhaustion at Time 2 to be equal, model fit decreased (χ2 = 4.757, df = 2, p < .10, Δχ2 = 4.565, df = 1, p < .05), suggesting that the two paths differ. Overall, these analyses provide no support for a reverse causation within the time lag of 4 weeks. ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 32 Table 1 Means, Standard Deviations, and Zero-Order Correlations between Study Variables M 1 Work hours SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 36.07 6.14 2 Emotional stability 3.44 0.63 .17 3 Exhaustion (Time 1) 2.70 0.64 -.05 -.34 4 Exhaustion (Time 2) 2.75 0.58 .01 -.25 .78 5 Time pressure 3.34 0.73 -.09 -.14 .38 .38 6 Pleasurable leisure experiences 3.86 0.60 .40 .08 -.14 -.02 -.01 7 Psychological detachment (Time 1) 3.34 0.83 .06 -.05 -.23 -.19 -.26 .39 8 Psychological detachment (Time 2) 3.29 0.79 -.02 -.02 -.34 -.34 -.29 .22 Note. N = 109. a r ≥ .19 are significant at p < .05. r ≥ .25 are significant at p < .01. ! 7 .73 Exhaustion and lack of detachment 33 Table 2 Results from Hierarchical Regression Analysis Predicting Psychological Detachment from Work Model 1 Model 2 t 0.41 -0.04 -0.60 -0.04 -0.60 -0.05 -0.73 -1.05 -0.07 -1.01 -0.05 -0.74 -0.04 - 0.68 10.90*** 0.68 10.11*** 0.69 9.08*** 0.68 -0.20 -2.78** -0.18 -2.39* -0.36 - 0.68 Time pressure (TP) -0.06 -0.80 0.60 1.91 Pleasurable leisure (PL) -0.04 -0.55 -0.67 -2.32* EX x TP -1.15 -2.13* EX x PL 1.02 2.26* Work hours Psychological detachment (Time 1) t 0.03 -0.07 0.73 Exhaustion (EX) R² F ΔR² F 0.53 39.69*** 0.53 39.69*** Note. N = 109. * p < .05. ** p < .01. *** p < .001. ! 0.54 33.60*** ß Model 4 ß Emotional stability ß Model 3 t 0.54 22.40*** ß t 9.35*** 0.59 19.20*** 0.03 0.01 0.04 7.72** 0.56 4.71* Exhaustion and lack of detachment 34 Table 3 Results from Hierarchical Regression Analysis Predicting Change in Exhaustion Model 1 ß Model 2 t ß Model 3 t ß Model 4 t ß t Emotional stability -0.00 -0.07 -0.01 -0.14 -0.01 -0.14 0.01 0.17 Work hours 0.03 0.41 0.03 0.45 0.01 0.02 -0.01 -0.11 Exhaustion (Time 1) 0.78 12.15*** 0.77 11.55*** 0.75 10.68*** 0.76 10.62*** -0.03 -0.47 -0.05 -0.64 -0.46 -0.94 Time pressure (TP) 0.09 1.27 0.00 0.00 Pleasurable leisure (PL) 0.09 1.16 -0.09 -0.44 DT x TP 0.12 0.40 DT x PL 0.42 0.91 Psychological detachment (DT) R² F ΔR² F Note. N = 109. *** p < .001. ! 0.61 55.15*** 0.61 55.15*** 0.61 41.38*** 0.63 28.61*** 0.63 21.32*** 0.00 0.02 0.00 0.22 1.79 0.42 Exhaustion and lack of detachment 35 Figure 1. Interaction effect of exhaustion and time pressure on change in psychological detachment over time. ! Exhaustion and lack of detachment 36 Figure 2. Interaction effect of exhaustion and pleasurable leisure on change in psychological detachment over time. !
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