Investigating flow at work and vital engagement of working adults across three years

Field: Psychology (Social Sciences)

This dissertation focuses on the process of sustaining authentic engagement among adults within work as a foundation for lifelong flourishing. Embedded within an evolutionary systems perspective of human development, this dissertation examines the processes underpinning work-related flow and vital engagement among school staff over a three-year period. The relevance of flow to optimal human functioning is well documented, with flow at work considered an important indicator and predictor of workplace engagement and wellbeing, both cross-sectionally and over short time periods. However, flow at work is also a dynamic and contextually bounded experience and when. Vital engagement, defined by the combination of work-related flow experiences alongside a sense of value-based cognitions and behavior, may provide a more contextualized understanding of engagement among working adults over longer periods of human development. Using data collected from school staff at an independent Kindergarten through Year 12 school in New South Wales, Australia (baseline N = 327), this research tests existing models of flow at work across a three year period, and then extends these models, providing an initial empirical examination of the vital engagement construct. First, providing background and a context for understanding engagement at work, a meta-analysis examining 54 independent samples (N = 16,171) was conducted from the last 30 years of flow at work – a form of daily authentic engagement with every day working activities. Findings point to the centrality of contextual factors such as social support, skill development opportunities, job resources, and autonomy as being critical to flow among working adults Second, extending previous models that have identified short-term associations between flow and optimal experiences and functioning, Study 1 examined how flow at work and strengths use relate across longer time periods, testing a cross-lagged panel model of strength use and work-related flow across five measurement occasions over three years. Although flow and strengths use were correlated within each time point, results failed to support cross-lagged relationships across time; subsequent strengths use and flow were primarily predicted by prior strengths use and flow respectively. Findings from Study 1 point to the contextual nature of flow at work, with the evidence that whilst strengths use and flow at work exhibit strong bi-directional relationships during short periods of time, over months and years they are also dependent on other additional conditions. Consequently, the necessity to consider a broader model of adult engagement in work that goes beyond subjective experience to include behaviors, cognitions, and purpose. Extending the concept of work-related flow to capture broader elements of engagement among working adults, Study 2 provides an initial test of the broader vital engagement construct, proposed by Nakamura (2001) a type of authentic engagement in a profession, and/or field of practice and domain of knowledge. Findings provide support for vital engagement as an emergent construct, with the latent model supported across multiple time points. Moreover, vital engagement was relatively stable over time. Finally, the dissertation considers implications for future research and application related to flow and engagement at work, with consideration of the conditions needed to facilitate vital engagement among working adults. As a whole, this dissertation calls for sophisticated approaches to conceptualizing, measuring, and analyzing vital engagement as it unfolds across one’s working life, with implications for better understanding of the conditions inherent in the complex nature of human flourishing.