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Heavy Work Investment and Job Burnout: The Moderating Role of Health Promotion and Psychological
Capital

Heavy Work Investment and Job Burnout: The Moderating Role
of Health Promotion and Psychological Capital

Shu-Ling Chen, Department of Business Administration and Graduate Institute of Logistics
Management, National Dong Hwa University
Hsin-Hua Hsiung, Department of Psychology, National Taiwan University
Chiu-Pin Chen, Division of Tourism, Recreation, and Leisure Studies, Department of Business
Administration, National Dong Hwa University

1. Introduction and Theoretical Framework

In general, employees fully investing in their work are rewarded with recognition and
praise from the managers of their organization (Harter, Schmidt, and Hayes, 2002). In the

existing literature, the phenomenon of employees working long hours is termed as “heavy
work investment,” which refers to individuals’ striving to commit themselves to work,
strongly focusing on work tasks, or being highly dedicated to their work (e.g., Snir and
Harpaz, 2012). Workaholism and work engagement are the two common types of heavy

work investment (Schaufeli, 2016; Schaufeli, Taris, and Bakker, 2006; Snir and Harpaz,
2012).
Some studies have investigated the various negative consequences (e.g., job burnout)
associated with these two common types. Even though several important findings have

been provided from these studies, this field continues to have two research gaps. First,
while Gillet, Morin, Sandrin, and Houle (2018) and van Beek, Taris, and Schaufeli
(2011) both explore the effects and consequences of workaholism and work engagement
simultaneously, nonetheless, they both adopt a cross-sectional design. Therefore, their

findings raise a concern about the causality. Our current study argues that due to the
different psychological states embedded in workaholism and work engagement (van Beek
et al., 2011), these two types of heavy work investment should influence employees’ job
burnout differently. To clarify this issue, there is a need to not only examine workaholism

and work engagement simultaneously, but also collect data at multiple time points to
understand the actual consequences of these two types of heavy work investment.
Second, the relationship between heavy work investment and job burnout remains
inconclusive. Different types of heavy work investment may have varying degrees

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