Introduction

Abstract

In this issue, four articles are published. Corin and Björk present a study of the psychosocial work environment among managers in public schools and in public elder care in Sweden. The study provides new insight into the working conditions of managers in the public sector, and at the same time, the study contributes to the development of research methods in the field. The study is based on Demerouti and Bakkers’ Job Demand-Resource model, which summarizes several well-known models for the studying of psychosocial work environment, primarily the Demand Control model of Karasek and Theorell and the Efford Reward model of Siegrist. The Job Demand-Resource model is most often used in survey studies, where employees assess their working conditions in a questionnaire. Corin and Björk, meanwhile, use the model as a basis for a qualitative study, which forms an external assessment of job demands and job resources. They use the ARIA method, based on the German ‘activity theory’. The study suggests that there is a strong imbalance between demands and resources in managers' work and the study illustrates how surveys and qualitative studies could be combined in a fruitful way (...)