Associations between psychological demands, decision latitude, and job strain with smoking in female hotel room cleaners in Las Vegas.
BACKGROUND
Little is known of the impact of the work environment on smoking among women holding low-paid jobs in the service sector.


OBJECTIVE
To study the associations between the components of the demand-control model with smoking in hotel room cleaners.


METHODS
We conducted a survey on work and health among 776 female hotel room cleaners in Las Vegas. Associations between psychosocial work characteristics and smoking were analyzed with multivariate regression analyses.


RESULTS
Psychosocial work characteristics were associated with smoking after adjustment for covariates. Effect estimates were substantially reduced by additional adjustment for ethnicity, but remained significant for high psychological demands and smoking prevalence (OR = 1.97, p = 0.02), high job strain and smoking prevalence (OR = 1.87, p = 0.04), and high job strain and smoking intensity (coefficient = 3.52, p = 0.03). When analyses were restricted to Hispanic workers and further adjusted for place of birth, low decision latitude (coefficient = 3.94, p = 0.04) and high job strain (coefficient = 4.57, p = 003) were associated with smoking intensity but not with smoking status.


CONCLUSIONS
Workplace smoking cessation programs may benefit from a primary prevention component reducing job strain among service workers. More research is needed on perceived and objective differences in psychosocial work characteristics across ethnic, immigrant, and other social groups within the same occupation.
Rugulies
Reiner
R
National Research Centre for the Working Environment, Copenhagen, Denmark.rer@nrcwe.dk
Scherzer
Teresa
T
Krause
Niklas
N
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000328:Adult; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D003657:Decision Making; D004651:Employment / Q000523:psychology; D005006:Ethnicity / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D005260:Female; D006306:Health Surveys; D006630:Hispanic or Latino / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006796:Household Work; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008875:Middle Aged; D008960:Models, Psychological; D009784:Occupational Diseases / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology*; D012044:Regression Analysis; D020377:Self Efficacy; D012907:Smoking / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology*; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology*; D016526:Workload