Premium
Developing a typology of the ‘duty to work’, as experienced by lay persons with musculoskeletal disorders
Author(s) -
Östlund Gunnel,
Cedersund Elisabeth,
Hensing Gunnel
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
international journal of social welfare
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.664
H-Index - 47
eISSN - 1468-2397
pISSN - 1369-6866
DOI - 10.1111/1468-2397.00209
Subject(s) - typology , agency (philosophy) , attribution , work (physics) , duty , psychology , social psychology , grounded theory , structure and agency , self , qualitative research , sociology , engineering , political science , mechanical engineering , social science , anthropology , law
Musculoskeletal diagnoses account for the majority of cases of reduced work capacity. This article investigates lay persons’ strategies in relation to work and musculoskeletal disorders. Twenty interviews were conducted and analysed using grounded theory. A typology of self‐presentations was developed. The interviewees’ self‐presentations revealed a strong sense of a ‘duty to work’. This sense of duty took four different forms, leading us to categorise persons expressing particular forms as workaholics, work manics, workhorses or relaxed workers. Relaxed workers seem to have the best prognosis for recovery as they had a confident self‐agency and worked to fulfil their own needs rather than those of others. This was in contrast to work manics, with an uncertain self‐agency and driven to work by others’ needs. In conclusion, awareness of such linguistic forms as self‐attributions and idiomatic phrases provides an opportunity to identify and talk about individual’s self‐agency and driving forces in the recovery process.