O-281 THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PARTICIPATION IN COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES AND WORK ENGAGEMENT: A PROSPECTIVE COHORT STUDY

The past study revealed that participation in community activities produces positive spillover into work and increases individual work engagement (WE). The purpose of this study is to examine what type of participation in community activities affects WE.

We conducted an online self-administered questionnaire survey to workers aged 20 years or older in Japan in March 2022 for baseline and March 2023 for follow-up. The 16,629 participants who responded to both of those questionnaires were included in the analysis. We regarded to participation in community activities such as neighborhood association activities, volunteer activities, sports-related activities, and hobby-related group activities respondents were classified as “participating” if they answered, “participating at least one to three times a month”; otherwise, they were classified as “not participating”. Japanese version of UWES-9 tool was used to assess WE. Unstandardized partial regression coefficients (95% CI) were calculated using multiple regression analysis with participation in each community activity as the explanatory variable and WE in 2023 as the outcome. This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of UOEH.

The standardized partial regression coefficient when adjusted for baseline WE for participation in each community activities were as follows, neighborhood association activities 1.22(95% CI, 0.71-1.66), volunteer activities 1.72(95%CI, 1.19-2.24), sports-related activities 0.86(95%CI, 0.52-1.20), and hobby-related group activities 0.91(95%CI, 0.56-1.26).

Participating in community activities and experiencing regular interaction with others is thought to be a positive emotion and have a positive impact on work. Further research is needed on the positive impact of community connections on the work.