Perception of Unemployment Reasons during Coronavirus Lockdown in Ukraine
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.6000/2292-2598.2020.08.03.30Keywords:
Labour market, unemployment, lockdown, job cuts, labour lay-off, COVID-19, pandemic, quarantine.Abstract
Work has always been a domain where individuals experience distress. However, in the current pandemic and into the unforeseeable future, job loss and unemployment stress will only exponentially increase. This manuscript represents the vision in vocational psychology which aimed to find out how the perception of the reasons for job cuts of males and females shifted in the first stage of the lockdown, to check and to compare the male’s and female’s ideas about the causes of their own long-term unemployment and their ideas about possible ways out of the unemployment in the situation of a COVID lockdown in Ukraine.
Methods: The research agenda includes exploring of the unemployment crisis among participants who were divided into three age groups of both gender: younger (18-25-year-old), middle (26-35-year-old), older (36-50-year-old). To characterize unemployment in the pandemic period, the questionnaire consisting of three scales was developed. It aimed to discover the reasons for job cuts, the ideas about the causes of the participants’ unemployment, and possible ways out of the unemployment situation. Student t-test was used to determine if the means of two sets of data (male and female of different age groups) are significantly different from each other.
Results: It is revealed that the unemployment in Ukraine among all groups of workers showed the different perception of the reasons for job cuts; their ideas about possible ways out of the unemployment in the situation of a COVID lockdown in Ukraine, which showed the generation gap in the job cuts perception and the basics of the interaction between the employer and the employee.
Conclusions: The study provides deeper insights into the labour market and its personal perception by males and females of different age groups in the first stage of a COVID lockdown. Concerning results, consider the passivity of the unemployed, their inertia and unproductive employment strategies, a decline in trust to the media as employment search, and a growing tendency to despair of the ability to find a job. On the positive side is a growing understanding of education importance.
References
Kochhar R. Unemployment rose higher in three months of COVID-19 than it did in two years of the Great Recession. JUNE 11, 2020. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/06/11/unemployment-rose-higher-in-three-months-of-covid-19-than-it-did-in-two-years-of-the-great-recession/
Temko N. No jobs, so what future? Half the world’s workforce on the edge. The Christian science monitor. https://www.csmonitor.com/World/2020/0506/No-jobs-so-what-future-Half-the-world-s-workforce-on-the-edge
Antoniuk D. Ukraine’s unemployed rises by 156,000 amid the pandemic https://www.kyivpost.com/business/ukraines-unemployed-grow-by-156600-amid-the-pandemic.html
Paul KI, Moser K. Incongruence as an explanation for the negative mental health effects of unemployment: meta-analytic evidence. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology 2006; 79(4): 595-621. https://doi.org/10.1348/096317905X70823 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1348/096317905X70823
Wanberg CR. The individual experience of unemployment. Annual Review of Psychology 2012; 63: 369-396. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-120710-100500 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-120710-100500
Contogiannis T. Economic growth, constraints and prospects for the South African economy. Discourse 2007; 35(2): 38-44.
Kingdon GG, Knight J. Race and the incidence of unemployment in South Africa. London: Blackwell 2004. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9361.2004.00228.x DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9361.2004.00228.x
National planning commission. Diagnostic overview. Cape Town, South Africa: Department of the Presidency 2011.
Dollard MF, Winefield AH. Mental health: overemployment, underemployment, unemployment and healthy jobs. Australian e-Journal for the Advancement of Mental Health 2002; 1(3): 10-11. https://doi.org/10.5172/jamh.1.3.170 DOI: https://doi.org/10.5172/jamh.1.3.170
Creed PA, Watson T. Age, gender, psychological well-being and the impact of losing the latent and manifest benefits of employment in unemployed people. Griffith University, Australia. De Witte H, Hooge J, Vanbelle E. 2010. Do the long-term unemployed adapt to employment? Romanian Journal of Applied Psychology 2003; 12: 8-14.
McKee-Ryan FM, Song Z, Wanberg CR, Kinicki AJ. Psychological and physical well-being during unemployment: a meta-analytic study. Journal of Applied Psychology 2005; 90: 53-75. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.90.1.53 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.90.1.53
Hanisch KA. Job loss and unemployment research from 1994 to 1998: a review and recommendations for research and intervention. Journal of Vocational Behavior 1999; 55: 188-220. https://doi.org/10.1006/jvbe.1999.1722 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1006/jvbe.1999.1722
Lucas RE, Clark AE, Georgellis Y, Diener E. Unemployment alters the set point for life satisfaction. Psychological Science 2004; 15(1): 8-13. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0963-7214.2004.01501002.x DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0963-7214.2004.01501002.x
Broomhall HS, Winefield AH. A comparison of the affective well-being of young and middle-aged unemployed men matched for length of unemployment. British Journal of Medical Psychology 1990; 63: 43-52. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8341.1990.tb02855.x DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8341.1990.tb02855.x
Johansson E, Böckerman P, Lundqvist A. Self-reported health versus biomarkers: does unemployment lead to worse health? Public Health 2020; 179: 127-134. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.puhe.2019.10.005 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.puhe.2019.10.005
Mathers N, Fox N, Hunn A. Trent Focus for Research and Development in Primary Heath Care: Using Interview in a Research Project. Sheffield: Trent Focus Group 1998.
Korniienko І, Barchi B. Enriching the coping behavior repertoire and motivation of the unemployed using metaphors. International Journal of Scientific & Technology Research 2020; 9(04): 1416-1422.
Reininghaus UA, Morgan C, Simpson J, et al. Unemployment, social isolation, achievement–expectation mismatch and psychosis: findings from the ÆSOP Study. Soc Psychiat Epidemiol 2008; 43: 743-751. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00127-008-0359-4 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00127-008-0359-4
Chang EC, Chang OD. Development of the frequency of suicidal ideation inventory: Evidence for validity and reliability of a brief measure of suicidal ideation frequency in a college
student population. Cognitive Therapy and Research 2016; 40: 549-556. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-016-9758-0 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-016-9758-0
Creed PA, Macintyre SR. The relative effects of deprivation of the latent and manifest benefits of employment on the well-being of unemployed people. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 2001; 6(4): 324-331. https://doi.org/10.1037/1076-8998.6.4.324 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037//1076-8998.6.4.324
Paul KI, Batinic B. The need for work: Jahoda's latent functions of employment in a representative sample of the German population. Journal of Organizational Behavior 2009; 30: 1-19. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.622 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/job.622
Creed PA, Muller J, Machin MA. The role of satisfaction with employment status, neuroticism, financial strain and categories of experience in predicting mental health in the unemployed. Personality and Individual Differences 2001; 30 (3): 435-447. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0191-8869(00)00035-0 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/S0191-8869(00)00035-0
Grawe K. Psychological therapy. Seattle: Hogrefe & Huber. 2004.
Fryer D, Fagin R. Coping with unemployment. International Journal of Political Economy 1993; 23(15): 95-120. https://doi.org/10.1080/08911916.1993.11643866 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/08911916.1993.11643866
De Witte H, De Cuyper N, Handaja Y, Sverke M, Näswall K, Hellgren J. Associations between quantitative and qualitative job insecurity and well-being. A test in Belgian banks. International Studies of Management & Organization 2010; 40(1): 40-56. https://doi.org/10.2753/IMO0020-8825400103 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2753/IMO0020-8825400103
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
