Two key goals for sustainable spatial planning are to promote low-carbon travel in daily life and to enhance human wellbeing through diverse human-environment interactions. Yet, the integration of these goals has been underexplored. This study investigates the potential for experiential diversity via active travel in different residential contexts within the Gävle city-region, Sweden. Over 15 months, we collected spatiotemporal data from 165 participants, analyzing 4,362 reported experiences and 13,192 GPS-derived travel trajectories. Our analysis uncovered a significant spatial discrepancy: while the travelled distances to locations of positive experiences typically ranged from 1.5 km to 5 km, active travel predominated only within 1.5 km. This discrepancy persisted across urban, suburban, and peripheral contexts. Although residents in different contexts reported the same types of experiences, urban dwellers travelled about 50 % farther for nature experiences compared with other positive experiences, whereas peripheral dwellers travelled twice the distance for urbanicity experiences compared with other positive experiences. Consequently, urban residents mostly relied on active travel for urbanicity experiences and motorised travel for nature experiences, with the reverse trend observed among peripheral dwellers. These results illustrate the importance of spatial scale for promoting diverse positive experiences via active travel, regardless of residential context. Effective planning strategies may include enhancing environmental diversity near homes and developing infrastructure that favours active over motorised travel for short to moderate distances.

Introduction. Eldercare organizations face high sickness absence rates and staff turnover and rely heavily on temporary workers to fill staffing gaps. Temporary workers may experience differences in job demands and resources compared to permanent workers, but this has been largely understudied.

Aim. To compare perceived job demands and resources between permanent and temporary Swedish eldercare workers.

Methods. Permanent and temporary eldercare workers in a Swedish municipality were invited to answer a digital survey on work environment conditions. Differences between permanent and temporary workers in job demands and resources were analyzed using multivariate analysis of variance adjusted for age, sex, place of birth, and percent of full-time work and univariate analyses were conducted to consider differences in specific factors.

Results. 1076 permanent and 675 temporary workers received the survey and the final study sample included 451 permanent and 151 temporary workers. Multivariate analyses revealed that temporary workers reported statistically significant lower job demands compared to permanent workers, but no statistically significant differences in resources were found between the groups. Univariate analyses showed that temporary workers reported lower quantitative demands, perceived exertion, and time spent bending forward, than permanent workers. These data suggest comparable support across groups, but a higher workload among permanent workers.

Conclusion. Our findings indicate that temporary workers experienced lower job demands than permanent workers, but that no notable difference was found in resources. Interventions aimed at distributing job demands more evenly among eldercare workers with different employment forms may be necessary.

Background: Flexible work arrangements (FWA) are common, but knowledge on how to organize flexible work to reduce negative consequences and preserve positive aspects is currently sparse, which hampers organizational initiatives.  

Purpose: This study aimed at determining the extent to which work strategies, work-related ICT use outside regular working hours (i.e., use of laptop, tablet, or smartphone, to handle information and facilitate communication), productivity, expectations of availability, and clarity of expectations about availability, had changed among office-based employees with FWA two and four months after a participative two-step workplace intervention.

Methods: An intervention group (n=97) was compared to a control group working as usual (n=70). The intervention, initiated and approved by the top management of the organization, included individual education intended to change work strategies, and workshops developing common rules and routines for FWA within the work group.

Results: Participants were satisfied with the intervention and reported larger changes than the control group in work strategies. No statistically significant effects were, however, found on ICT use, productivity, or expectations of availability.

Conclusions: This participative workplace intervention was successful in changing employees work strategies but may not be effective in influencing ICT use outside regular working hours, productivity, expectations of availability, and clarity of expectations about availability.

Background: 

Digital transformation has resulted in extensive use of information and communication technology (ICT) for occupational work in various domains (i.e. workplace, home, elsewhere). A better understanding of how ICT-use for work influence 24-h physical behaviors is needed for developing policy recommendations to promote health in a large fraction of the working population, including hybrid and teleworkers.

Purpose:

To examine the association of ICT-use and telework from home with 24-h physical behaviors in different domains among office workers in Sweden.

Methods:

We analyzed cross-sectional data from a Swedish cohort on flexible work (FLOC 2020-2025). Office workers (n=250) wore a thigh-worn accelerometer to assess physical behaviors and sleep over 7 days. Time spent working using ICT (minutes: computer, tablet, phone) and work domain (office, hybrid, telework from home) were self-reported. Linear mixed models were used to determine associations of ICT-use and work domain with 24-h compositions of sedentary, low, moderate-vigorous, and sleep behaviors, with adjustment for covariates. 

Results:

Results indicated that more ICT-use for work was significantly associated with more total sedentary time relative to physical activity of different intensities (p=0.01, R2= 0.096), but not with sleep relative to wake time. Hybrid and telework from home were significantly associated with more sedentary time relative to physical activity (p<0.05) and longer sleep relative to wake time (p<0.1).

Conclusions:

Using digital technology for work may contribute to more sedentary behavior in office workers, especially for hybrid and teleworkers.

Practical implications:

Interventions to reduce sedentary behavior may focus on reducing ICT-use and target both office, hybrid, and teleworkers.

Funding: The Swedish Research Council for Health, Working life and Welfare, FORTE (2019–01257).

Background Achieving work-life balance in flexible work arrangements is a challenge for both individuals and organizations, but intervention studies are sparse. We aimed to investigate the extent to which work-life balance, work-home interference, and home-work interference changed among office workers with flexible work arrangements after a workplace intervention. 

Methods Together with a large governmental agency in Sweden, we co-created an intervention with a focus on work strategies and common rules for flexible work in two steps: 1) an education to change individual work strategies and 2) a workshop to develop common rules and routines for flexible work within the workgroup. Two comparable departments participated, with 97 workers in the group receiving the intervention and 70 in a control group. Work-life balance and work-home/home-work interference were measured using questionnaires before the intervention (baseline), after the education (6-month follow-up), and after the workshop (12-month follow-up); and analyzed using linear mixed models with adjustments for covariates. 

Results We found no marked effects of the intervention on work-life balance, work-home interference, and home-work interference, with statistically non-significant effect estimates at both 6- and 12-months follow-ups. 

Conclusions Further studies are needed to evaluate whether other initiatives could be more effective in promoting work-life balance among office workers with flexible work arrangements. 

This study investigates experiences of temporary work among care personnel in eldercare. Semi-structured interviews were performed with fifteen temporarily employed care personnel in municipal nursing homes or home care and analysedusing phenomenography. The informants’ experiences of having temporary employment were characterised by either a sense of flexibility or, more commonly,uncertainty, lack of control over life, time and economic situation, as well as difficulties associated with always being available. The informants’ experiences of working as temporary employees were characterised by the enjoyment of work and job satisfaction, differing experiences regarding the division of work and communication, but also being in an exposed position. The results reflect an experience of being in avulnerable position. Taking these results into consideration in developing interventions to enhance the working conditions for temporarily employed might as a secondary result decrease the turnover and increase the continuity of the care for the elder.

Work time control may offer opportunities, but also implies risks for employee recovery, influenced by increased work-related ICT use and overtime work. However, this risk–opportunity tradeoff remains understudied. This study aimed to test two different models of associations between work time control, work-related ICT use, overtime work, and the need for recovery. These models were constructed based on data on office workers with flexible work arrangements. Cross-sectional data were obtained with questionnaires (n = 2582) from employees in a Swedish multi-site organization. Regression models treated the three determinants of the need for recovery either as independent, or as linked in a causal sequence. The test of independent determinants confirmed that more work time control was associated with less need for recovery, whereas more ICT use and overtime work were associated with a higher need for recovery. In a test of serial mediation, more work time control contributed to a greater need for recovery through more ICT use and then more overtime work. Work time control also had a competitive, indirect effect through a negative association with overtime work. Our results suggest that work time control is beneficial for employee recovery, but may for some be associated with more work-related ICT use after regular working hours, thus increasing recovery needs. Policies that support work time control can promote recovery, but employers must attend to the risk of excessive use of ICT outside of regular working hours.

Objective: To determine to what extent pre-COVID-19 experience of telework was associated with perceived psychosocial working conditions (PWC; job demands, social support and influence at work) during the COVID-19 pandemic among white-collar workers in Sweden, and to determine to what extent the association depends on demographic factors, organizational tenure, and amount of computer use.

Methods: Cross-sectional questionnaire data from 603 white-collar workers were collected October-December 2020 in an industrial company.

Results: In general, telework experience was not significantly associated with PWC. Women who began teleworking due to COVID-19 reported more job demands than women not teleworking. For those who began teleworking due to COVID-19, managerial support increased with age.

Conclusion: In general, telework experience was not associated with PWC, but telework due to COVID-19 may have influenced PWC differently depending on gender and age.

Objectives

Physical and cognitive tasks occur together in many occupations. Previous reviews of combined tasks have mainly focused on their effects in a sports context. This review investigated to which extent combinations (concurrent or alternating) of occupationally relevant physical and cognitive tasks influence responses reflecting biomechanical exposure, stress, fatigue, performance, and well-being.

Methods

We searched Scopus, Pubmed, Cinahl, and Psychinfo for controlled experiments investigating the effects of combinations of occupationally relevant physical and cognitive tasks in participants aged 18 to 70. In total, we identified 12 447 records. We added recent papers that had cited these studies (n = 573) to arrive at a total of 13 020 publications. After screening for relevance, 61 studies remained, of which 57 were classified to be of medium or high quality. Of the 57 studies, 51 addressed concurrent tasks, 5 alternating tasks, and 1 both concurrent and alternating tasks.

Results

Most studies of concurrent physical and cognitive tasks reported negative effects, if numerically small, on indicators of biomechanical exposure, fatigue, and performance, compared to a physical task alone. Results were mixed for stress indicators, and well-being was too little studied to justify any conclusions. Effects depended on the tasks, including their intensity and complexity. Alternating physical and cognitive tasks did not appear to influence outcomes much, compared to having passive breaks in-between physical tasks.

Conclusions

The reviewed evidence indicated that concurrent physical and cognitive work tasks have negative, yet small effects on biomechanical indicators, fatigue and performance, compared to performing the physical task alone, but only if the physical task is intense, and the cognitive task is complex. Alternating between physical and cognitive tasks may have similar effects as breaking up physical tasks by passive breaks, but studies were few. Future studies should address ecologically valid combinations of physical and cognitive tasks, in particular in controlled field studies devoted to the long-term effects of combined work.