Publications by authors named "Morten B Nielsen"

Revictimization research has largely ignored bullying victimization, and knowledge of the association between childhood bullying and adulthood revictimization is scarce. Research is also needed to explore whether bullying exposure in combination with childhood violence exacerbates the risk of revictimization. This study sought to address these research gaps in a national probability sample of Norwegian adults (N = 4,299, age range: 18-74 years).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

ProcessOptimizer is a Python package designed to provide easy access to advanced machine learning techniques, specifically Bayesian optimization using, e.g., Gaussian processes.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Emotional dissonance, where workers hide their true feelings to meet job expectations, increases the risk of mental distress, particularly in nursing roles.
  • A study of 1426 home-care workers found that high-quality leadership can help reduce the negative effects of emotional dissonance on mental health.
  • Supportive, empowering, and fair leadership were shown to buffer the impact of emotional dissonance, suggesting that improving leadership quality could be a key strategy in preventing mental health issues in emotionally demanding jobs.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Sleep loss from short off-times between shifts leads to increased subjective sleepiness, but does not significantly affect mood or cognitive performance.
  • The study involved 66 participants comparing a quick return (8 hours off) scenario to a control (16 hours off) and found significant sleepiness differences.
  • This is the first experimental design of its kind, suggesting further research should focus on the impact of multiple quick returns on overall functioning.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Several studies have found higher sickness absence in shared and open workspaces than in private offices, but little is known about why these differences occur. We propose and test job control as a potential mechanism underlying observed differences in the risk of physician-certified sickness absence between private offices and shared and open workspaces.

Methods: We conducted a counterfactual mediation analysis using observational survey data from a nationally representative sample of Norwegian employees merged with prospective data from national registries (N=5512).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Purpose: Bullying of leaders is an underexplored topic in organizational research. To fill this knowledge gap, the aims of this study were to determine the prevalence of bullying of leaders and to examine whether holding a formal leadership position influences the relationships between exposure to bullying and the outcomes job satisfaction and depression.

Methods: Data from two separate surveys were employed: (1) A cross-sectional occupation specific sample comprising 678 Norwegian child welfare social workers; (2) A nationally representative probability sample of 1,608 Norwegian employees with two time-points (6 months' time-lag).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

This trial presents a laboratory model investigating the effect of quick returns (QRs, <11 h time off between shifts) on sleep and pre-sleep arousal. Using a crossover design, 63 participants worked a simulated QR condition (8 h time off between consecutive evening- and day shifts) and a day-day (DD) condition (16 h time off between consecutive day shifts). Participants slept at home and sleep was measured using a sleep diary and sleep radar.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The study aimed to examine how a modified work schedule with longer breaks between shifts impacts insomnia, daytime sleepiness, and work-related fatigue in healthcare workers compared to their regular schedules.
  • Conducted in Norway, the trial involved 66 healthcare units and assessed symptoms before and after a 6-month period, utilizing questionnaires and statistical analysis to determine outcomes.
  • Results revealed that extending the time between shifts reduced quick returns, leading to slight improvements in insomnia and daytime sleepiness, but did not significantly affect work-related fatigue, emphasizing the importance of adequate rest for healthcare workers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The Norwegian home care services experience a high level of sick leave, a large proportion of which is due to common mental disorders. A substantial number of such cases can be attributed to psychosocial factors at work, but more knowledge about occupation-specific risk factors is needed to develop targeted preventive measures to reduce sick leave levels. The aim of this study is to identify the most prominent psychosocial work factors influencing the risk of sick leave spells due to common mental disorders.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The study explores how daily interpersonal conflicts affect the emotional reactions of naval cadets, focusing on the role of neuroticism.
  • Cadets experienced increased negative feelings on days with conflicts, particularly those high in neuroticism, who also reported lower positive feelings than their peers.
  • These findings enhance our understanding of affective events theory by highlighting how individual differences, like neuroticism, influence emotional responses to workplace conflicts.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

We investigated associations between the number of pain sites (NPS) and role conflict with medically certified, pain-related sickness absence (SA) in employees of Norwegian enterprises (N = 5,654). Latent profile analyses identified exposure profiles based on 3 types of role conflict (work-role conflict, work-life conflict, and emotional dissonance). Multinomial logistic regressions estimated effects on absence (short-term absence of less than 56 days, long-term absence of more than 56 days) during 1 year after survey.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Most research on workplace bullying has examined the impact of the mistreatment on those exposed. Although bullying also is assumed to have significant ripple effects on bystanders, the empirical evidence for this line of research is highly fragmented and inconclusive. The overarching aim of this planned systematic review and meta-analysis is therefore to determine whether witnessing bullying of others at the workplace is associated with health problems and lower well-being among the observers.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The appraisal of control over work intensity and decisions at the workplace is a well-established determinant of health and well-being among employees. Building on job design theories, the overarching aim of this study was to determine office layout as a predictor of perceived job control. Specifically, we investigated between-group differences in control by contrasting employees in cellular offices with employees in shared/open offices, as well as effects on control among employees transitioning from one office design to another.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: This study aimed to investigate (i) the main effects of office design and access to telework from home (TWFH) on self-certified sickness absence and (ii) the moderating effects of access to TWFH on the relationship between office design and self-certified sickness absence.

Methods: The study used cross-sectional survey data from a nationally representative sample from Norway (N=4329). Research objectives were investigated with negative binomial hurdle models, adjusting for age, gender, education level, leadership responsibility, and time spent on office work.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

This two-part study examined if the buffering effect of transformational leadership on the association between work-related ambiguity and job satisfaction is contingent upon whether a follower holds a formal leadership position him/herself. Data from two separate surveys were employed: Study 1: A sample of 845 respondents from Belgium. Study 2: A national probability sample of 1,608 Norwegian employees.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Earlier findings suggest that social stress such as abusive supervision may promote pain. In the present study we examine the possible moderating role of genetic variability in the gene in this process.

Methods: The data were collected through a national survey drawn from the National Central Employee Register by Statistics Norway.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Environmental stressors such as repeated social defeat may initiate powerful activation of subconscious parts of the brain. Here, we examine the consequences of such stress (induced by resident-intruder paradigm) on the pituitary gland. In male stressed vs.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates how different types of workplace mistreatment influence insomnia levels among child welfare workers, focusing on client violence, cyber harassment, and colleague bullying.
  • It involved a survey of 424 Norwegian workers, utilizing various analytical methods to assess the relationship between mistreatment and insomnia over a six-month period.
  • The findings indicate that client violence and colleague bullying significantly contribute to increased insomnia, with bullying being the most impactful, while each form of mistreatment is considered distinct rather than overlapping.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • This study examines how the perceived power dynamics between victims and perpetrators affect experiences of workplace bullying and the intent to leave a job, focusing on employees in Oslo's child welfare service.
  • It was found that victims who self-identify as such see a greater power imbalance with their bully compared to those who don't label themselves as victims.
  • Interestingly, the study revealed that those in a power balance with their bully felt a stronger urge to leave their job after being bullied, suggesting that bullying prevention measures should be universally applied, regardless of power dynamics.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: To prospectively investigate the reciprocal associations between tiredness at work (TAW) and exposure to bullying behaviors and to determine the role of conflict management climate (CMC) as a moderator of these associations.

Methods: A two-wave national probability sample of employees in Sweden (18 months between waves, 921 participated at both waves) measuring TAW, workplace bullying, and CMC. Structural equation modelling was used to test four hypotheses about the longitudinal associations between feeling tired at work and bullying, and CMC as a moderator for the two directions.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The psychosocial work environment is of great importance for regaining health and productivity after a workplace disaster. Still, there is a lack of knowledge about the impact of a disaster on the psychosocial work environment. The purpose of this study was to examine whether employees' perceptions of role clarity, role conflicts, and predictability in their work situation changed from before to after a workplace terrorist attack.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Previous findings suggest that abusive supervision, i.e., subordinates' perceptions of their supervisor's behaviours as hostile (excluding physical aggression), may increase the risk of health complaints.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: In this study, we examined exposure to workplace bullying as a predictor of registry-based benefit recipiency among workers struggling with work participation due to common mental disorders. Further, we examined if the experience of receiving social support moderated the association between workplace bullying and benefit recipiency.

Design: Secondary analyses of a randomized controlled trial.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Previous findings suggest that exposure to social stress in the form of abusive supervision may increase the risk of musculoskeletal disorders. In the present study, we examined the link between abusive supervision, the genotype and spinal pain. The data were collected through a national survey drawn from the National Central Employee Register by Statistics Norway.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF