Occupational Health Psychology

Course	V-816-OHPS
Semester	20242
ETCS	3,75
Core	No

Year	1. year
Semester	Summer 2024
Level of course	N/A
Type of course	Elective
Prerequisites	No prerequisites.
Schedule	No schedule found.
Lecturer	Ágústa Rakel Davíðsdóttir
Content
Occupational health psychology concerns the application of psychology to ensure the quality of work life and promote the safety, health, and well-being of employees. The term ‘health’ in ‘occupational health psychology’ includes employees’ physical, emotional, cognitive, motivational and behavioural aspects. This course builds up participants’ knowledge about various factors that affect the wellbeing and safety at work, for the workplace and the employees. The focus will be on key terms in the field and how occupational factors affect health and wellbeing of employees. Emphasis will be on prevention and practical solutions, and special attention will be given to communication factors at the workplace. The course will discuss incivility, negative acts, bullying, sexual and gender-based harassment as well as other forms of harassment and violence at work. Moreover, the course will cover stress and related issues such as burnout. The role of managers in psychosocial health promotion and prevention will be discussed as well as the importance of psychosocial risk assessment.
Learning outcome - Objectives
Course Learning Outcomes: Knowledge The student should be able to: 1. Identify, define, and explain key terms and concepts relating to incivility and stress factors at work, risk factors and consequences for the employees and workplace. 2. Identify, define, and explain key terms relating to prevention and psychosocial risk assessment at the workplace. 3. Explain the role of managers and HR in keeping a healthy psychosocial work environment and the effects of management style on the wellbeing of the employees. Skills The student should be able to: 4. apply concepts and develop and apply strategies to different organizational contexts, in relation to unhealthy workplace situation and how to improve them. 5. apply solution-focused thinking in the discussion of healthy work environment. Competences The student should be able to: 6. Evaluate and assess psychosocial risk factors and design programs to increase psychosocial health for employees. 7. Critically assess and evaluate the suitability of different approaches in making a good work environment in various contexts. 8. Formulate and synthesize general principles for the optimization of a healthy psychosocial work environment
Course assessment
No assessment found.
Reading material
No reading material found.
Teaching and learning activities
No activities found.
Language of instruction	English