Obsessive and Harmonious passion for work: The ...

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Clearly the levels obsessive or harmonious passions play a role in the adaptation to work's conditions, the harmonious passion being the most efficient because ...
Obsessive and Harmonious passion for work: The case of French farmers AMOURA, Camille (1); BERJOT, Sophie (1); ALTINTAS, Emin (2); LENOIR, François Régis (1) (1)

Université de Reims - Champagne Ardenne, France Université Lille Nord de France - Lille 3, France

(2)

Introduction According to the motivational approach of passion (Vallerand et al., 2003), an activity is defined as a passion when it presents three properties: the activity is perceived as pleasant, is defined as important and involves the allocation of time and energy into it. This approach is also dualistic because it proposes two forms of passions which consequences are opposite: obsessive and harmonious passion. Obsessive passion (OP) is defined as the result of controlled internalizations from internal or external pressures. Harmonious passion (HP) is defined as the result of autonomous internalizations of activities that are initiated freely and maintained by the self out of pressures and contingencies. The aim of this study is to explore the role of those two kinds of passion in relation to work stress and suicidal risk among French milk producers whose share at least two of the above defined characteristics of passion: 1) the allocation of a lot of time and energy put into the professional activity, and 2) the importance of the activity for the self. So, according to the theory, we might expect that milk producers are particularly passionate toward their professional activity. However, recent studies have shown that their working conditions are particularly difficult and that milk producers are particularly at risk of stress and suicide (Deary et al., 1997). Those effects of working condition on stress and suicidal risk might be different according to the type of passion : while harmonious passion might alleviate perceived stress and suicidal risk, obsessive passion might on the contrary favor them.

Method Seventy and four French milk producers (22 females, 52 males) were recruited by post mail (in collaboration with their mutual benefit society). The mean age was 46.12 years (SD= 8.63). Three variables were assessed: (1) passion, (2) stress, and (3) hopelessness. Passion was assessed with the Passion Scale (PS, 14 items, Rousseau et al., 2002), which explores three dimensions assessed on a seven-point scale : obsessive passion (5 items), harmonious passion (5 items) and the general level of passion (4 items). Stress was assessed with the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS, 14 items, Cohen et al., 1983), which is a self-report instrument that assesses the level of perceived stress (PSS-14). According to Lesage et al. (in press), the mean score of stress of French employees is 2.51 (SD=.56). Suicidal risk was assessed with the Beck Hopelessness Scale (BHS, 20 items, Beck et al., 1974). Scores >= 10 mean that one must worry about the suicidal risk of the individual, scores >= 13 mean a high risk of suicide.

Results cluster 1 (n =12) cluster 2 (n= 45) cluster 3 (n=17)

After descriptive and correlational analysis, a cluster analysis on the 3 passion subscales was run to highlight distinct profiles of participants according to their level and type of passion. Results showed that participants could be grouped into 3 distinct clusters. Participants of cluster 3 presented a low level of passion (n=17) with low harmonious and obsessive passion, participants of cluster 2 a moderate level of passion (n= 45) coupled with moderate harmonious and obsessive passion, and participants of cluster 1 a high level of passion (n= 12) coupled with low obsessive and high harmonious passion which could be entitled Harmonious passion profile. Finally, anovas were run with clusters as the independent variable and perceived stress and suicidal risk as dependant variables. Results showed that cluster 3 presented the highest level of job related stress and suicidal risk. Clusters 2 and 1 presented the same scores (no significant differences) on job related stress, but, the level of hopelessness was lowest for cluster 1.

Clusters

"High level of

"Moderate level of

"Low level of

passion "

passion"

passion"

Mean

Mean

F

p

η²

Mean

age

45,25

a

46,23

a

46,47

a

Obsessive

2,69

a

2,77

a

2,00

Harmonious

6,01

a

3,71

b

1,94

0,08

0,93

0,00

c

3,79

0,03

0,10

c

112,43

0,00

0,76

Passion

Level

6,23 a

5,06 b

2,60 c

73,14

0,00

0,68

PSS 14

2,53

a

2,94

b

3,32

c

6,75

0,00

0,16

6,75

a

9,27

b

12,35

b

4,04

0,02

0,10

Stress Suicidal Risk BHS 20

Note. N= 74 ; Code Female (1), M ale (2) For each dependent variable, means with different subscripts indicate a significant difference

  at p< .05 using Newman-Keuls' post hoc test

Table 1: Means and Standard deviations for the study variables as a function of clusters

Discussion & Conclusion These results first of all showed that French milk producers are particularly stressed and at a moderate to high risk of suicide. These results also allowed us to confirm the role of French milk producer’s passion toward work, in particular its effect on affective and cognitive dimensions of life. These results confirm the precedent results found in literature on the positive role of passion, especially of harmonious passion (Vallerand et al., in press). If work is not a passion for all French milk producers, a majority allots a lot of time and energy into it and consider it as very important. This is in itself a protective factor against stress and in particular against the risk of suicide. Indeed, the relation toward work of passionate producers is important to take into consideration as harmoniously passionate producers present a lower suicidal risk that obsessive passionate ones. Clearly the levels obsessive or harmonious passions play a role in the adaptation to work’s conditions, the harmonious passion being the most efficient because it is associated with the lowest level of suicidal risk. Those results have then clearly an important theoretical implication but also support future studies on passion for work.