Sport, leisure and well-being—an ergonomics perspective

Abstract

In highly automated, post-industrial societies, the demands of the workplace often remain poorly matched to the capacity of the human operator. Occasional tasks that involve much walking, stair-climbing, lifting or carrying still impose an excessive physical demand, particularly upon the elderly and female employees, but in general the physical demands of work are now less than optimal for health. Deliberate leisure activity has thus become important to well-being. Examples of excessive demand can still be found among managers and in machine-paced but physically light industrial work. Nevertheless, an increasing proportion of employed workers face the opposite stress of a mental demand that is far below their capacity; sometimes, there is also a need for sustained vigilance in a responsible, machine-monitoring task. It has been argued that industrial fitness and recreation programmes make a useful contribution to human well-being in each of the above situations. Published articles describe increased worker satisfaction, with an improved corporate image, a facilitation of employee recruitment, an increase in the quantity and the quality of production, a decrease in absenteeism and employee turnover, a reduction in health care costs, and a reduced incidence of occupational injuries following the introduction of work-site programmes. Nevertheless, there remains a need to confirm such reports by well-designed and carefully controlled experiments, using standardized exercise programmes. The future will see a displacement of the labour force from the production line to part-time service jobs, where it will be much more difficult to organize and deliver occupational fitness programmes. An increased proportion of the population will also be permanently unemployed. Sport and leisure programmes may thus need a community rather than an industrial base; nevertheless they will continue to have an important role, both in creating more employment and adding meaning to the lives of those displaced from traditional occupations.