Impact of Environmental Uncertainty on Depression and Anxiety Among Chinese Workers: A Moderated Mediation Model

Purpose

Environmental uncertainty has reached unprecedented levels in recent years. While there is substantial knowledge about the connection between environmental uncertainty and organizational outcomes, limited attention has been devoted to investigating its impact on employees' depression and anxiety symptoms. Grounded in job demands-resources theory, this study aims to explore the relationship between environmental uncertainty and employees' depression and anxiety symptoms, and it further investigates the mediating role of work pressure and the moderating role of union practices.

Methods

In September 2022, we undertook a cross-sectional survey study, gathering data from 1081 employees across various enterprises situated in Liaoning, China. Throughout this timeframe, notable global occurrences heightened the awareness of environmental uncertainty. Following the exclusion of participants who did not provide information on the main variables, the final valid sample comprised 940 employees. To test all hypotheses, a series of confirmatory factor analyses and path-analytic procedures were conducted using Mplus 7.0.

Results

Our results confirm that environmental uncertainty, as a high job demand, increases employees' work pressure, thereby elevating rates of anxiety and depression; the indirect relationship between environmental uncertainty and employees' anxiety and depression through work pressure is stronger when union practices are lower.

Conclusion

Our findings indicate the detrimental impact of environmental uncertainty on employees' mental health, and highlight the roles of work pressure and union practices. In light of this, organizations should take steps to mitigate employees' perceptions of environmental uncertainty and establish mental health programs, in cooperation with union practices, to protect employees' mental well-being.

Work stress, technological changes, and job insecurity in the retail organization context

The study intends to investigate the relationship between work stress and job insecurity, as well as technological changes and job insecurity, with job satisfaction acting as a mediator. The study was conducted among Pakistani retail industry employees using survey questionnaires distributed online and in stores. The sample was composed of 262 retail workers from the FMCG and shopping mall industries. The responses were screened using the statistical software tool SPSS, and hypotheses were examined through SMART-PLS. The findings show that work stress has a strong relationship with job insecurity; additionally, the relationship appears to be statistically significant (β = 55.7%, p < 0.05), indicating that there is an increased level of job insecurity if work stress is increased. However, technological advancements showed less influence on job insecurity and had statistically insignificant results (β = 5.9%, p > 0.05). This demonstrates that many technological changes cause high levels of job insecurity because employees fear that they will be unable to cope with the changing environment. Furthermore, the mediating mechanism of job satisfaction was found to be significant, as employees with lower levels of satisfaction reported higher levels of insecurity, aiding in the narrowing of the gap in this section of the study. The study also has practical implications because the results show that the retail industry needs to act quickly to make sure workers do not worry about losing their jobs, especially now that COVID-19 is spreading like wildfire.

Exploring the Development Strategies of Science Parks Using the Hybrid MCDM Approach

Science parks contribute to a country’s economic growth, promote industrial transformation, and meet the development needs of high-tech industries. They also play an essential role in enhancing technological development and competitiveness. Due to the impact of the fierce U.S.-China trade war on the global economy, many Taiwanese companies are considering moving their high-end product production lines back to their home country. This trend may promote the growth of the population in the surrounding areas of science parks and affect the limited infra-structure at the same time. This study explores how science parks could achieve sustainable development goals by formulating their development strategy. We summarized four evaluation aspects for constructing the driving factors for developing the science park through literature review and interviews with experts. Combined with the hybrid multiple-criteria decision-making (MCDM) approach, we analyzed stakeholders’ satisfaction among the four aspects of the driving factors for the development of the science parks and put forward appropriate strategy recommendations. We found that the improvement of public infrastructure (PI) can improve not only the environmental quality (EQ) but also promote the business environment (BE) and the working environment (WE). This improvement could attract domestic and foreign manufacturers, create employment opportunities, expand the park’s scale, and eventually promote industrial development. This research improves the method of collecting empirical data to establish the driving forces for developing science parks through suitable development strategies.