Association between work stress and health behaviours in Korean and Japanese ageing studies: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

ObjectivesLimited research has focused on the association between work stress and health behaviours in Asian countries. We aimed to explore the effect of work stress on two health behaviours among employees aged 45 years or above in two countries with ageing populations, Korea and Japan.DesignA cross-sectional study.SettingThis secondary data analysis was conducted on baseline data from the Korean Longitudinal Study of Aging (KLoSA, 2006) and the Japanese Study of Aging and Retirement (JSTAR, 2007 and 2009).ParticipantsIncluded in the analytical sample were 4982 responders without missing data aged 45 years or older who reported work positions and hours (KLoSA n=3478, JSTAR n=1504).Main outcome measuresWork stress was represented by the short version of the effort-reward imbalance (ERI) model. We used logistic regression and multinomial logistic regression to investigate the association between work stress and smoking (binary current smoking) and between work stress and drinking (categorical volume of alcohol). Socioeconomic and work-related characteristics were taken into consideration, and we examined the potential interaction between ERI and gender.ResultsWork stress as measured by ERI ratio was significantly associated with both smoking and drinking in the KLoSA analysis; after the model was fully adjusted, ORs were 1.45 (95% CI 1.17 to 1.80) and 1.44 (95% CI 1.09 to 1.90), respectively. In analysis of the data from JSTAR, the ERI ratio was associated with smoking (OR 1.37, 95% CI 1.01 to 1.89) but not with drinking. No statistically significant interaction was found between ERI and gender in any model (p=0.82 in KLoSA data and p=0.19 in JSTAR data).ConclusionsStatistically significant associations were found between work stress and both smoking and drinking behaviours in Korea and between work stress and smoking in Japan. Government integration of effort-reward balance programmes and health promotion programmes could effectively promote population health in these two Asian countries.

Association between residential proximity to major roadways and chronic multimorbidity among Chinese older adults: a nationwide cross-sectional study

“…In European countries, individuals with a higher level of education may tend to understand and follow health-promoting methods, thereby attenuating the impact of environmental hazards [ 75 ]. In contrast, in other countries, particularly in Asia, although individuals with higher education might understand the hazards mentioned above, their ability to adopt healthy behaviors still may be limited by lifestyle [ 76 ] or occupational stress [ 77 ]. It has been verified that in China, individuals with a higher level of education are more inclined to prefer residential proximity to major roadways [ 32 ], which gives them access to richer social resources and shorter commute times.…”

Working status and risk of Alzheimer's disease: A Mendelian randomization study

“…A previous study found that working stress increased risk of dyslipidemia by affecting the HPA (Zhang et al., 2021 ), and chronic cortisol elevation increases glucocorticoid synthesis and glucose utilization, increases visceral fat deposition, and accelerates lipolysis, resulting in dyslipidemia (Kao et al., 2020 ). Additionally, working stress also affects smoking habits, a cross‐sectional study of the Asian population showed that working stress was significantly associated with smoking((OR = 1.45, 95%CI = 1.17–1.80) (Cheng et al., 2022 ). Shift work is the basic form of enterprise working time organization, which refers to the formation of work groups of different shifts within the working day, in the same work place for the production process.…”