Task performance among employees above age 65: The role of cognitive functioning and job demand-control
Publication year
2015Number of pages
13 p.
Source
Work, Aging and Retirement, 1, 3, (2015), pp. 296-308ISSN
Publication type
Article / Letter to editor

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Organization
SW OZ BSI AO
Personeelsmanagement
Journal title
Work, Aging and Retirement
Volume
vol. 1
Issue
iss. 3
Languages used
English (eng)
Page start
p. 296
Page end
p. 308
Subject
Responsible Organization; Work, Health and PerformanceAbstract
Owing to the aging of Western societies, an increasing number of people over age 65 are now working in bridge employment. Research is needed to understand how job characteristics in bridge employment should be designed to support older employees' productivity, considering potential declines in intra-individual resources. Drawing on lifespan development of resources and job design models, we investigated the interplay of cognitive functioning, job demands, and job control, and their impact on task performance, in a sample of workers in bridge employment. In total, 228 employees from a Dutch temporary employment agency that contracts workers aged 65 years and older participated in this longitudinal study, with a 1-year time lag. Of the panel, 74.1% of the respondents were male, and the mean age was 69.02 years (range 65-80 years). Cognitive functioning, job demands, job control, and task performance were assessed two times with thoroughly validated self-report measures. Good cognitive functioning emerged as an essential intra-individual resource in order to maintain good task performance for employees aged 65 years and older. After including the influence of job demands and job control, positive effects of cognitive functioning on task performance remained significant only in a high-strain job (with high job demands and low job control). This outcome suggests that age-related changes in cognitive functioning among employees above the age of 65 years only affect productivity at work when the job demands are too high relative to the available job control. Implications for retirement research and lifespan perspectives of job design research are discussed.
This item appears in the following Collection(s)
- Academic publications [203856]
- Electronic publications [102283]
- Faculty of Social Sciences [27309]
- Nijmegen School of Management [12898]
- Open Access publications [70939]
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