Relationships between job characteristics, burnout, and intention to leave the organization in the Job demands-resources model

The research aims to verify some of the assumptions of the Job demands-resources model. The sample consisted of 505 respondents, and the instruments used were the Job Characteristics Questionnaire, the Work Burnout Scale, and the Scale of Intention to Leave the Organization. First, the hypothesis of the mediating role of burnout in the relationship between work demands and the intention to leave the organization was tested. In the final model, job demands positively predicted burnout (beta = .47, p < .05), which was further associated with increased intention to leave the organization (beta = .50, p < .05). Bootstraping method ( b = .28, Bootstrap 95% CI = [.16, .40]) and Sobel test ( z = 7.57, p < .001) both confirmed the role of burnout as a complete mediator. Afterwards, the moderating role of work resources in the relationship between work demands and burnout was examined. Testing the buffer effect of three work resources (job control, peer support, and supervisor support) in the relationships between quantitative, cognitive, and emotional demands with burnout, resulted in only one statistically significant interaction effect. The found effect (beta =-.10, p < .05) showed that job control acts as a buffer of the harmful effect of quantitative demands on the occurrence of burnout, and to a somewhat greater extent in the case when these demands are high. The obtained results supported the health impairment process and contributed to the current debate on the replicability of the buffer hypothesis on the domestic sample, with further discussed limitations and practical implications.