Abstract

The study was conducted to investigate the influences of food service employees' job burnout, job engagement, and workplace safety perception on their job satisfaction. A survey was administered on 589 school food service employees in Gyeongbuk from December 5, 2005 to February 18, 2006. The final response rate was 71% (N = 416); the data were analyzed using SPSS Windows (ver. 12.0). A majority of the respondents were females (99.0%) and 40 years old or older (75.3%); 84% were temporary contract-based or irregular workers. Among the job burnout dimensions, exhaustion (2.98 +/-0.59) was rated higher than cynicism (2.33 +/-0.54), while professional efficacy level (3.61 +/-0.47) was relatively high. In terms of job engagement, the means of absorption (3.67 +/-0.49) and dedication (3.65 +/-0.52) were higher than that of vigor (3.22 +/-0.46). A systematic environmental level (3.15 +/-0.58) was lower than safety knowledge level (3.63 +/-0.49) among the workplace safety statistics, whereas the anxiety level (3.25 +/-0.74) was relatively high. The food service staff were more satisfied with 'supervisors' and 'co-workers' than with 'pay' and 'promotion'. A hierarchial regression analysis revealed that dedication, absorption, systematic environment, and safety knowledge were significant factors to increase job satisfaction and exhaustion which significantly decreased their job satisfaction.

• Keywords: food service employees; school food service; job satisfaction; job burnout; job engagement; workplace safety