Locked in Permanent Employment-Longitudinal Associations With Depressive and Functional Somatic Symptoms.

Abstract

To study mental health as a precedent and an outcome of not being in the preferred job ("locked-in situation"). Longitudinal data from age 16 to 43 were derived from surveys of the Northern Swedish Cohort. Changes in mental health were studied with analyses of variance for repeated measures. Getting out of locked-in situation was associated with improving and getting into locked-in with worsening mental health between age 30 and age 43. The worsening was more pronounced and the improvement less pronounced in white-collar than in blue-collar employees. Poor mental health at age 16 predicted locked-in situation in early middle age. The findings clarify the bidirectional nature of the associations between locked-in situation and poor mental health, as well as the importance of social class in assessing these associations.