Bakker et al (2007) conducted a study to investigate the inuence of job resources on employee engagement when demands of the job are high. The participants were 805 Finnish teachers recruited via postal questionnaire.

The researchers tested two hypotheses:

1. that job resources act as buffers and can reduce stress and disengagement when teachers are exposed to pupil misbehaviour

(having more resources reduces stress caused by misbehaviour)

2. that when confronted with pupil misbehaviour job resources were increasingly important in inuencing work engagement

(resources were even more important when exposed to stressful situations).

Researchers measured work engagement using the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (Finnish version) that measured engagement along three subscales: vigour, dedication and absorption. Participants were assessed on their responses to statements such as “When I wake up in the morning I feel like going to work” and “I am enthusiastic about my job Statements were rated on a 7-point scale

(0 = never to 6 = always).

Pupil misbehaviour was measured on a 6-item scale adapted from Kyriacou and Sutcliffe (1978).

Participants responded to a general opening question: “As a teacher, how great a source of stress are the following factors to you?” They were then asked to respond to six specic behaviours and situations such as noisy pupils and maintaining class discipline. Items were scored on a 5-point scale (1 = hardly ever to 5 =

very often).

Job resources were assessed using the Health Organization Barometer. Each job resource was assessed with three items. Job resources included: job control, innovativeness, information, appreciation, organizational climate and supervisor support, and were measured by participants’ responses to questions such as

“Do your colleagues appreciate your work?” All resources were assessed on a 5-point scale

(1 = hardly ever to 5 = very often).

The results were as follows.

● Pupil misbehaviour was not correlated or weakly correlated to the six job resources.

● All six job resources were positively correlated to vigour, dedication and absorption. Appreciation was the strongest predictor of work engagement.

● Five out of six job resources moderated the effects of pupil misbehaviour on vigour and absorption. Four resources interacted with pupil misbehaviour regarding dedication of work engagement.